


four's a crowd, but not when it's you

by alateni



Category: SEVENTEEN (Band)
Genre: Gugudan and Oh My Girl are mentioned/side characters, I needed this in my life, M/M, Multi, OT4, Poly Relationships, kind of
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-06-28
Updated: 2018-02-18
Packaged: 2018-07-18 20:47:01
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 12
Words: 36,722
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7330090
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/alateni/pseuds/alateni
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>What happens when you put Xu Minghao, Wen Junhui, Kim Mingyu, and Jeon Wonwoo under one roof? A little bit of drama, some accidents, and a lot of gay that's what.</p><p>Also known as: I needed a OT4 story of these four and so I wrote it.</p><p>Alternatively: snapshots throughout the lives of WonHuiGyuHao in a domestic university AU.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. milk

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Minghao never imagined his life would turn out like this but he's not entirely opposed to the idea.

“Junnie hyung wants us to buy some more milk before we come back,” Minghao states, looking down at his phone as the tall man beside him groaned. Chuckling, Minghao slips the device back into his pants pocket before dragging the giant puppy beside him back over towards the freezer section of the supermarket.

“But we were _just_ about to leave,” Mingyu whines as Minghao ducks into the freezer to look for milk. “Literally we were second in line to pay, a couple more minutes and we would have been out of there.”

“Then we’d probably have to go back in to get the milk because apparently Wonwoo hyung is having a craving for cereal and _you_ know that he can’t eat cereal without milk,” Minghao replies, grabbing the milk bag before tossing it gently into the shopping cart which Mingyu was pushing. Leading the other boy back towards the checkout, Mingyu pouts as Minghao begins to load things onto the conveyer belt. “Pay,” Minghao nudges Mingyu’s arm, laughing when Mingyu grumbles about having to do everything in the house before pulling his wallet out and swiping his card. After grabbing all the shopping bags, Minghao and Mingyu exit the mart and begin the ten minute walk back to their shared apartment.

Minghao hums as Mingyu begins to blabber about his day at school – completely forgetting the troubles at the supermarket. As Mingyu launches into a story about his asshole of a professor, Minghao grins. He had never expected to become friends with the tall man beside him. Really, Minghao hadn’t thought he’d meet half the people he did. He was the quiet new kid, having only arrived at Pledis University a couple months ago, and was extremely shy. His Korean wasn’t good, he didn’t understand half of the traditions and customs, and Minghao felt like he looked and acted differently than everyone else. As such, he ended up secluding himself in the library and dance studio whenever he could. He talked to people in his classes of course, but never enough to make good friends.

However, there had been one person he had interacted with quite frequently. Wonwoo, the last of their four housemates, and Minghao had met in the library. While Minghao didn’t really read much – he mostly visited the old building because of the quiet and seclusion – Wonwoo was another story. The older boy loved to read, and whenever Minghao arrived at the library he seemed to always have a book in his hands. Over the course of weeks, Minghao and Wonwoo ended up sitting beside each other, with Minghao reviewing his notes and Wonwoo reading whatever book he was into that day. While the two never really talked, it was a comfortable relationship, and Wonwoo was always the first person to pop into Minghao’s head whenever his mom asked him if her little baby had made any friends over in Korea.

“Did you guys get the milk?” is the first thing Minghao hears when Mingyu opens the door. Junhui pops his head out of the kitchen, smiling widely at the snacks in Minghao’s hands, before disappearing back into the kitchen. Sighing, Minghao brings the frozen food to the fridge while Mingyu unpacks the other snacks. Wen Junhui, basically the reason Minghao made more friends and actually ended up talking to Wonwoo. The other Chinese boy had accompanied Wonwoo to the library one day and, after growing bored of trying to bother Wonwoo into talking to him, switched his attention to the quiet boy beside him. After noticing Minghao struggling to understand his notes, Junhui had jumped to the rescue and basically translated the whole page for him. A little taken aback at the whole gesture, Minghao remembers Wonwoo speaking up for the first time in order to berate Junhui for overstepping his boundaries.

And everything else, as they say, was history. Junhui and Wonwoo got into an argument, with Minghao watching amusedly, and the whole situation ended with Junhui buying the two ice cream – after which, Junhui somehow got Minghao’s phone number and began to force the younger boy into accompanying the two everywhere. Along the way, Minghao ended up meeting the rest of their friends, along with a certain Kim Mingyu. The taller boy was Wonwoo’s childhood friend – which led Minghao to constantly wonder how he had never encountered him before – but Mingyu had literally crashed into his life when Junhui suggested Minghao room with them. Minghao had been living on campus for a while, but seeing as campus prices were quite high, the Chinese boy had been attempting to find another place to live. Catching wind of his predicament, Junhui revealed that him and Wonwoo lived together and were looking for another housemate. What Junhui didn’t tell him however, was that the cheap house came without AC and had a giant puppy child.

Upon meeting Mingyu, Minghao was completely taken aback. The man was nothing like what he appeared. He had rumours, of course, of a famously handsome Kim Mingyu. And he wasn’t going to lie and say Mingyu wasn’t handsome, but the man was _so childish_. Constantly needing attention and bouncing around the house like a puppy, Minghao honestly considered moving back to China – he didn’t sign up for this. Mingyu’s hyper energy combined with Junhui’s dramatic flair was almost too Minghao to handle but, surprisingly, he had learned to deal with it (it helped that Wonwoo was there, although the deep voiced male was, at times, weirder than the two of them combined) and now, Minghao wouldn’t give up his housemates for anyone else.

“I think we need to buy more eggs,” Wonwoo calls after a loud _crash_ resounded through the house. “Mingyu dropped the ones you guys just bought.”

 

Never mind.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have no regrets.
> 
>   
> Hope you're smiling!  
> 
> 
>   
> ~ alateni  
> 


	2. salt

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Mingyu is salty, and he's a cheater, but at least he doesn't have to pay - or get out of bed for that matter.

“Do you think I should add more salt?” Mingyu inquires, staring down at the saucepan in front of him. “It tastes a bit bland.”

“That’s too much sodium,” Minghao replies, yawning. It was too early for the Chinese boy to be up, the sun had barely even begun to rise and Wonwoo and Junhui were both sleeping peacefully in their shared room, but Mingyu had decided that now was the best time to test some new recipes and had dragged his unwilling roommate to help him. Not that Minghao was entirely against the idea – Mingyu made the best dishes, sometimes even better than his mom, but that was a secret. Waking up at the crack of dawn to experiment with sauces however? Not Minghao’s favourite way to start the morning.

“But it doesn’t taste good,” Mingyu wrinkles his nose. He reaches over Minghao’s lap to grab the salt shaker but his hand is swatted away before he could grab the object. “Minghao what else am I going to add?”

“Something that won’t give you high blood pressure,” Minghao wipes his eyes, blinking in attempt to chase the sleepiness away. He confiscates the salt, placing it behind his body, and drums the tabletop with his fingers when Mingyu fixes him with an annoyed look.

“Look, it isn’t _that_ much salt, I’m only going to add a tablespoon,” Mingyu reasons, turning the heat of the stove off before his sauce could burn. “Also you’re sitting _way_ too close to the element,” Mingyu points at the inch of distance between Minghao and the stove before moving over and physically lifting Minghao and setting him on the island across the stove. Making sure to grab the salt before Mingyu carries him, Minghao places the salt shaker behind him once again.

“Yeah but you already added in salt before when you were mixing the sauce,” Minghao points out, tapping Mingyu’s cheek. The taller man groans, resting both hands on either side of Minghao’s thighs, before pouting. “No, I’m not falling for this you need to eat healthier. I saw those ramen packages in the trash yesterday – don’t even try to hide those from me.”

“You eat ramen too!” Mingyu exclaims, throwing his hands into the air before returning them into their previous place. “And I was too lazy to make the home-made kind. Plus, Junhui hyung was the one who bought those.”

“Way to throw him under the bus,” Minghao snickers. “And I only eat it when there’s nothing else to eat – unlike you. Try adding something other than salt to flavour the sauce.”

“Like what?” Mingyu questions, raising an eyebrow.

“How am I supposed to know, you’re the chef,” Minghao shrugs. Mingyu sighs, tapping Minghao’s nose with his finger before sneakily encircling the Chinese boy’s waist in an attempt to grab the salt. Catching on, Minghao lets his torso fall forward, effectively pushing Mingyu back slightly, before grabbing the salt and pushing it farther behind him.

“If you push that any further it’s going to fall off the table,” Mingyu points out, nuzzling Minghao’s hair with his nose. “Then we’ll have to clean it up and get bad luck. I don’t want bad luck.”

“I have enough bad luck – rooming with you,” Minghao replies. “If I roomed with Wonwoo hyung or Junnie hyung I wouldn’t have to be up so freaking early in order to argue with you over your daily sodium intake.”

“Technically you don’t _have_ to argue with me over how much salt I get a day,” Mingyu responds, smiling cheekily when Minghao looks up and grimaces. “You just choose to do so because of reasons unknown to me.”

“Because contrary to popular belief, I _don’t_ want you to die early?” Minghao responds with a snort and a sarcastic look. He lets his head fall forward again, effectively bumping against the crook of Mingyu’s neck and causing the tall puppy to let out a soft ‘ _oof_ ’.

“Aw, so you _do_ care about me, how sweet,” Mingyu replies, and although Minghao can’t see his face, he’s certain the other male is smirking. Wrapping his long arms around Minghao, Mingyu picks the other boy up easily and slowly swings him in a circle, careful not to let any of Minghao’s long limbs hit the drawers and tables around them, before setting the slightly shorter boy on the ground.

“No, it’s ‘cause then I wouldn’t have anyone to feed me,” Minghao snorts, ears slightly flushed when Mingyu shoots him a doubtful expression. “You don’t believe me,” Minghao states when Mingyu crosses his arms over his chest and hums in acknowledgement.

“Who would?” Mingyu shoots back.

“When did you get this cheeky?” Minghao sighs, walking over to the salt and picking it up once again.

“Ever since I became roommates with you,” Mingyu replies before shooting Minghao another pleading look. “Please just let me use the god damn salt.”

“Maybe,” Minghao replies.

“What?” Mingyu deadpans, staring at Minghao for a second before letting out a confused laugh. “What does that mean?”

“I’ll think about it,” Minghao smiles sneakily before leaving Mingyu standing there in shock. The Chinese boy skips towards the fridge, pulling out some yoghurt, before grabbing the coffee beans from another drawer. “If you make me coffee I’ll think about it faster.”

“You’re just going to say no after I make you coffee,” Mingyu sighs, but grabs the bag nonetheless. Turning the stove on again, the Korean boy begins boiling some water while Minghao swipes a spoon from the drying rack beside the sink and starts to eat his yoghurt. “This always happens whenever you lecture me about being ‘healthy’. Even though without me you’d probably be a lot less healthy because literally none of you three ever set foot in the kitchen unless I’m here, making food.”

“That’s not true,” Minghao licks the spoon. “This time could be different, and besides, that’s ‘cause we’re all too lazy to cook. Junnie hyung can cook quite well too you know.”

“But he won’t, because, once again, he’s lazy,” Mingyu rolls his eyes, stirring the coffee mixture.

“I can hear you,” a tired voice calls from the other room, causing Minghao to stifle his laughter while Mingyu grins. “You two are up way too early for a freaking Saturday.”

“Is it Saturday?” Minghao blinks, his movements pausing suddenly. He turns to Mingyu, raising an eyebrow as the tall man smiles sheepishly and places the coffee in front of him. Grabbing the now empty yoghurt container, Mingyu practically flees the kitchen to throw it out – saucepan and salt forgotten. “Kim Mingyu did you really wake me up so freaking early on a _Saturday_ to experiment with _salt_?” Minghao screeches, crashing through the apartment in an attempt to catch the elusive Korean male.

“Maybe?” Mingyu replies, stopping in front of Minghao and enveloping the angry boy in a hug before Minghao could punch him. Picking the much lighter man up, Mingyu twirls around before landing on the couch, effectively trapping Minghao underneath him, and pecks the Chinese boy’s nose. “It’s not my fault you don’t keep track of what day it is. And anyways, I couldn’t sleep,” Mingyu says in lieu of an explanation, placing another kiss on Minghao’s nose. “And Junhui hyung and Wonwoo hyung had sex last night–”

“Ew,” Minghao wrinkles his nose as Mingyu plants another kiss on his forehead. “I didn’t need to know that.”

“–So I didn’t want to walk in on the aftermath,” Mingyu continues, peppering the rest of Minghao’s face with small kisses.

“That’s gross,” Junhui announces when he spots the two younger males on the couch. He yawns, stretching his arms before going to claim Minghao’s abandoned coffee as his own.

“What’s gross is that you didn’t invite me last night,” Mingyu replies, nuzzling his nose into Minghao’s sensitive neck – causing the other boy to giggle softly. “Also put on a shirt.”

“No,” Junhui responds simply, sitting down across from the cuddling couple on the couch.

“Where’s Wonwoo hyung?” Minghao asks after a brief silence. Mingyu had flipped their positions at that point, so Minghao’s head was resting on the taller boy’s chest while Junhui was still sipping from his stolen coffee.

“Here,” comes Wonwoo’s deep voice – even more so considering he just woke up. The boy staggers into the living room, takes one look at the scene, and plops down beside Minghao’s feet, making sure to pick them up and place them on his lap as to not to squish them. “So, what are we going to do?” Wonwoo asks while poking Minghao’s feet. The younger boy squirms at the contact, causing Mingyu to groan underneath him.

“Food,” Minghao manages to squeak out as Wonwoo continues tickling his toes. “I want to ea– _Stop that_ ,” Minghao sits up, glaring at Wonwoo and tucking his feet under himself as Mingyu sits up as well. Mingyu leans over, as does Wonwoo, and Minghao finds both boys resting their heads on his shoulders while Junhui laughs at his predicament. “Someone has to make me food,” Minghao says weakly, while Mingyu shakes his head no and Wonwoo breathes into his ear.

Smirking at Minghao’s squirming, Junhui stands up and pulls the other Chinese boy towards him. Wrapping him in a hug, Junhui cuddles with the shorter boy on the loveseat while Mingyu and Wonwoo fall into each other on the larger couch. The four males stay like that for a bit, merely enjoying the presence of each other and the rare silence. While they all lived under the same roof, it was difficult for all of them to be around at the same time, especially with conflicting schedules, classes, and jobs in between, it was nice to just lay around the apartment doing nothing. Minghao hums lowly when Junhui runs his fingers through his hair, eyes lidded while he observes Wonwoo playing with Mingyu’s fingers. The taller boy has his other hand wrapped around Wonwoo’s waist while Junhui’s own legs were entangled with Minghao’s. Minghao amuses himself by comparing their positions with noodles, before his stomach grumbles at the mention of food.

“I’m still hungry,” Minghao announces. Junhui groans, dropping his hand, before his own stomach voices its agreement. “And it seems like I’m not the only one,” Minghao teases, raising his head to grin at Junhui before flopping back down in a lazy state.

“What do you want to eat?” Mingyu asks, sighing in the knowledge that he’d probably have to be the one to cook while the rest of his housemates would most likely go back to bed and have another intense cuddling session. He pouts at the thought, wanting very much to be a part of it, but is soon brought out of his thoughts by Wonwoo’s laughter.

“Should we just order pizza or something?” Wonwoo suggests, tapping Mingyu’s cheek amusedly. “I don’t think any of us really want to move – other than to get back to bed.” Three heads nod in agreement, but it takes another ten minutes for someone to move and get the phone in order to order. After hanging up, Junhui looks at the other three boys, before grinning.

“Last one to the bed has to pay,” he announces, before setting off in the direction of his and Wonwoo’s bedroom. Minghao whines, but is quick on his feet to follow him, followed by Wonwoo and a lagging Mingyu. Pouting at his chances of winning, Mingyu shoots his hand out in front of him, effectively tripping Wonwoo, before jumping over the elder and tugging at Minghao’s hand to hurry him up. The two younger boys disappear into the room soon after Junhui, leaving Wonwoo bruised and slightly confused.

“Are you coming?” Mingyu pokes his head of the bedroom, grinning evilly as Wonwoo picks himself up. Luckily, he hadn’t fallen too hard – or crashed into anything – so other than a hurt pride, the boy was fine. Growling at Mingyu, the Wonwoo stalks into the room and jumps over Junhui to back hug Minghao who was settling in on the other side. Mingyu laughs, climbing onto the bed beside Junhui before grabbing the fallen covers and wrapping the four of them in a nest of blankets. “You still have to go grab the pizza when it comes,” Mingyu announces as he reaches over to lace his fingers with Junhui’s. Wonwoo groans in agreement, causing Minghao and Junhui to laugh, before the four boys settle into a silence, happy and blissful in each other’s company. That is, until the doorbell rings and Junhui ends up kicking Mingyu off the bed in surprise.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For clarification, I'll be using their actual ages and the Canadian university system so:
> 
> Wonwoo - literature major - fourth year  
> Junhui - double major in software design and computer programming - fourth year  
> Mingyu - culinary arts major - third year  
> Minghao - nutrition major - third year
> 
> I don't know how university works because I'm a smol bean so please bear with me- Also there was so much fluff and cuddling here I don't know what I'm doing anymore but I'm pretty much just this melted puddle on the floor by now.
> 
>   
> Hope you're smiling!  
> 
> 
>   
> ~ alateni  
> 


	3. we

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The boys have some time off to spend with another.

“What do you want to do?” a lazy voice asks, causing Minghao to look over from his spot on the couch to stare at the other male. Wonwoo peers back at him from the opposite love seat before turning over and flopping down on his stomach.

“What do you mean?” the deep voiced male replies as Minghao continues to watch Junhui play with the carpet. Since Minghao and Wonwoo had claimed the two couches for themselves, Junhui had resigned himself to lie on the floor. It was comfortable (apparently) so Junhui was now sprawled out in the space between the living room and kitchen (which were connected as one big space anyways).

“What do you want to do?” Junhui repeats unhelpfully, turning his head to the other side to stare back at Minghao. The two continue looking at each other silently before Junhui winks and Minghao gags. “That was rude,” Junhui comments, pouting slightly. Minghao merely laughs in response.

“That still doesn’t answer my question,” Wonwoo speaks up after Minghao’s laughter dies down and Junhui stops sulking.

“Technically you didn’t even answer my question in the first place,” Junhui shoots back, causing the two same aged friends to begin bickering. Rolling his eyes, Minghao turns to his other side to watch Mingyu in the kitchen. The other male was oddly quiet for once, focused on completing his preparations for his assessment next week. It was some kind of cooking test – Minghao wasn’t entirely sure how Mingyu’s courses worked – and Mingyu had been testing different combinations of spices all day. The entire apartment smelt like cumin and it was making Minghao hungry – despite the fact that they had already eaten. The unwashed bowls from their meal were still piled high next to Mingyu, along with the various devices Mingyu had used for his previous expirements.

“Minghao,” Junhui suddenly whines from the floor, causing Minghao to steer his attention back to the whiny Chinese boy. Flinching when Junhui lunges forwards to place his chin on the couch, Minghao lets out a small squeal that sends Wonwoo on a laughing spree and causes Junhui to smirk. “That was very manly.”

“Shut the fuck up,” Minghao replies, ears turning red, before the younger boy gracefully shoves Junhui’s face back to the floor. The older male’s head hits the ground with a _thump_ and sets Wonwoo off on another round of giggles.

“Everyone is so rude in this house,” Junhui announces, rubbing his chin. It was growing slightly red, not enough for Minghao to feel sorry, but enough for Junhui to pout and run off to the kitchen in order to ice it.

“Junhui wants to watch a movie,” Wonwoo announces when he finally stops laughing enough to breathe. Minghao raises an eyebrow at the suggestion, looking over to where Junhui and Mingyu were. The older one had seemingly forgotten about his quest for ice and was now bothering Mingyu for a taste of whatever the chef was making. Minghao pouts slightly when he sees Mingyu pass Junhui a plate of food.

“What kind of movie?” Minghao replies, eyes still set on the food in Junhui’s hands.

“I don’t know, that’s what he was going to ask you,” Wonwoo replies, yawning lazily. It was the first time in a long while that the four of them were all free for the weekend (other than Mingyu – but his experiments with cooking didn’t really count in their minds) and so as a sort of celebration, Junhui had announced that they were to spend quality time with one another. It was a kind of useless proclamation in Minghao’s opinion, considering that even if they did go out, most of the time they were together anyways (with the addition of a couple other friends) but Junhui was insistent.

“Mingyu, I think Minghao wants some,” Junhui grins, breaking Minghao out of his yearning stare. Blinking, Minghao sits up when Mingyu laughs and brightens considerably when he sees the giant puppy pile some more food onto a plate. “How about you Won?” Junhui asks, settling next to Wonwoo on the love seat. The other boy grumbles about having to give up his space but allows Junhui to sit down when the Chinese male offers him a bite of his food.

“What is it?” Wonwoo asks, sniffing the spoonful Junhui offers him.

“Curry,” Mingyu replies, bringing over another large plate and pushing Minghao’s legs off the couch. The shorter boy practically falls onto the floor along with his legs but manages to stay balanced somehow. In revenge, Minghao punches Mingyu in the shoulder before grabbing the plate and digging in. “Wow, thanks, what nice manners you have Hao.”

“This is coming from you Mingyu,” Junhui snickers. “The giant puppy who likes to sneeze over his things – including his roommates.”

“That’s because you all belong to me,” Mingyu winks, causing Wonwoo to choke on his rice and Minghao to, once again, slap Mingyu’s shoulder. “It’s true,” Mingyu insists, and seeing as no one bothers to correct him, the tall boy smiles happily before throwing his arms over Minghao and resting his face in the other’s stomach. “I can hear you eating.”

“Wow, I wonder why,” Minghao rolls his eyes, placing another spoonful of rice into his mouth. “Is this what you were testing?”

“Yeah,” Mingyu nods, closing his eyes. “I have an assessment on Tuesday for curry. We were learning about different spices this month so it’s the big project thing that always happens at the end of a unit. The professor gave us the weekend to test and experiment and we’ll be making our own personal dishes for him come Tuesday.”

“Culinary school is weird,” Junhui announces. The boy had fully given up his plate of curry to Wonwoo, but had taken over the territory of Wonwoo’s shoulder in exchange. Junhui was now fully cuddled into Wonwoo’s side, arms thrown over the other’s waist, and head nuzzling into the skinny boy’s neck.

“You’re weird,” Wonwoo replies smartly, poking Junhui on the nose gently before finishing the curry. Minghao laughs, offering Mingyu a bite – to which the other male gladly accepts – before also licking the plate clean. Placing it on the table in front of him, Minghao shifts until Mingyu gets up and drags the other boy down in the opposite direction, causing Mingyu to lie on his back with Minghao on his chest.

“Was it good?” Mingyu asks, running his fingers through Minghao’s hair gently.

“Yeah, not very spicy though,” Minghao replies.

“I bet Soonyoung would die if he ate it,” Wonwoo snickers, causing Junhui to laugh too. “That boy can’t handle his spice.”

“He can drink like a sailor though,” Junhui comments, earning a nod from everyone else in the room.

“The curry isn’t designed to be spicy, I made it sweeter,” Mingyu explains. “This way it’s not as savoury and filling so you can eat it in between meals as a sort of snack.”

“Hm,” Minghao nods, sleepy now that he had eaten. “And what was your inspiration for this dish Mingyu ssi?” Minghao teases, voice taking on a kind of announcer tone.

“You,” Mingyu grins, causing Junhui to whine about too much cheesiness. To which Wonwoo shushes him with a, ‘you’re one to talk’. “I’m not kidding,” Mingyu continues when Minghao stares up at him. “You always say you don’t like eating big meals because you don’t like feeling so stuffy afterwards so I made a seemingly less filling meal. This way you can eat more often and even though you’re technically eating less, you’re still getting the right amount of calories and what not.”

“Basically he’s making sure you’re well fed,” Junhui calls, bringing Wonwoo closer to his frame. “Which is what we do all the time, you too Won, you guys are too skinny for your own good.” Placing a kiss behind Wonwoo’s ear, Junhui teasingly lifts up the other boy’s shirt and pokes at the exposed flesh before Wonwoo pulls his shirt down and smacks Junhui’s thigh.

“Thanks for that I guess,” Minghao mumbles into Mingyu’s shirt. “But it’s not our fault.”

“Yes, we know,” Mingyu breathes, “different body types and all that. We’ve heard more than enough of that kind of stuff from you Mr. Future Nutritionist.”

“It’s true though,” Minghao mutters under his breath, causing Mingyu to laugh.

“Yup, being too skinny or too fat isn’t a compliment and is bad for your health, we know and we love you all the same Hao,” Junhui declares, placing another kiss on Wonwoo’s cheek. “You too Won.”

“So much love right now,” Wonwoo rolls his eyes, but returns Junhui’s affections with a kiss of his own – on the lips this time. Smiling into the kiss, Junhui returns the favour, gripping Wonwoo’s face in his hands before laughing gently when they pull apart.

“You’re hopeless,” Minghao declares when he looks back up at Mingyu only to find the other boy pouting at the act of affection. Leaning forwards, Minghao places a peck on Mingyu’s lips, only for the other boy to whine at the lack of contact. Rolling his eyes, Minghao allows Mingyu to sit up and place a full kiss on his lips. Pressing against Mingyu’s wider frame, Minghao eventually finds himself sitting in Mingyu’s lap, lips still making contact with the other, as the two slowly exchange soft kisses.

“I still want to watch a movie!” Junhui declares, causing Mingyu and Minghao to break apart. Wonwoo laughs at the boy beside him, Junhui was obviously feeling left out (Mingyu and him weren’t very different if you looked at them long enough), before waving his hand in the air. “Yes Won?”

“Do you want to watch The Martian? I heard it’s good but I never got to go see it in theatres,” Wonwoo suggests.

“I watched that with Soonyoung hyung and Chan,” Minghao remembers Soonyoung swinging by his class along with Chan before forcefully taking the other to watch said movie – saying something about how ‘you never hang out with us anymore’, despite the fact that they had literally seen each other that morning for brunch. Yes, Minghao eats brunch. And you best believe he enjoys it.

“Is it any good?” Mingyu asks, placing one last kiss on the side of Minghao’s mouth before leaning back and smirking at Junhui. The older boy narrows his eyes at Mingyu’s declaration of war and stands up forcefully. Walking over to Minghao, Junhui places his hands on the shorter boy’s shoulders and brings him into a sweet kiss before Minghao can answer Mingyu’s question. Releasing Minghao with a smirk, Junhui winks at Mingyu before Minghao is turned around and kissed again – this time by a certain puppy-like giant. Dizzy from the lack of air and low key annoyed at being man handled, Minghao slips out of Mingyu’s grasp after the kiss and runs over to Wonwoo. Laughing, Wonwoo opens his arms, letting Minghao slip into them, before placing a peck on the younger boy’s head.

“This is ridiculous,” Minghao mutters, tightening his hold on Wonwoo while the older boy laughs and blows air into his ear. Shuddering at the motion, Minghao pouts. “Why can no one leave me alone,” Minghao whines when Wonwoo leans forward to bite his ear gently.

“Because you’re adorable – no matter what you say,” Junhui replies, causing Mingyu and Wonwoo to nod along. “Anyways, let’s go watch that movie! I’ll get it set up in our room.” Jumping up excitedly, Junhui disappears into his shared room. Mingyu gets up after him, grabbing the two plates on the table before quickly going to wash them while Wonwoo and Minghao entangle themselves and go their separate ways.

Minghao heads into his own room and grabs the multitude of blankets and pillows from his bed as well as Mingyu’s while Wonwoo lends Mingyu a hand in washing the dishes. Placing all the blankets and pillow in a pile on the floor in the other room, Minghao eventually helps Junhui push the two beds together before placing the nest of comfy objects on top. Fiddling with the monitor (Junhui had the best screen out of all of them for some reason so they often watched movies off of his computer), Junhui eventually gets the movie set up.

Sitting down next to Minghao, Junhui throws an arm over the smaller boy and waits for Wonwoo and Mingyu to join them. The two make their appearances soon after, with Wonwoo closing the lights and crawling next to Minghao and Mingyu quickly turning the movie on before settling in beside Junhui. The four boys quiet down to watch the movie, content to lie beside one another for the next two hours or so.

“My worst fear is being left alone on Mars.”

“Then don’t go to Mars Mingyu.”

“Plot twist: he’s alive.”

“Mingyu, that’s not a plot twist if that’s the plot.”

“Do you think people scared of heights get scared of space? Since, you know, technically they can’t fall–”

“I’m done, get out.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This whole chapter was inspired by the movie night I had with my cousins yesterday. Yes, we watched The Martian. Great movie. And yes, Mingyu's lines at the end were actual quotes as said by yours truly. I'm quite intelligent when I'm tired.
> 
> Also Mingyu's cooking is inspired by Shokugeki no Soma because I rewatched the first season and they made curry and I was hungry-
> 
> Minghao is my child. Just wanted to say that.
> 
>   
> Hope you're smiling!  
> 
> 
>   
> ~ alateni  
> 


	4. spoil me rotten

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Mingyu finds himself confined to his bed, miserable and bored. But not for long.

“Remember Mingyu, this isn’t your fault,” were the last words Seungcheol had said to him as he roughly tucked the younger boy into his bed. The elder male, although he very much wanted to stay and make sure Mingyu was okay, had a sick Jeonghan at home to take of and could only place a cup of water and various snacks (after being prompted to do so by Jisoo over the phone) on Mingyu’s bedside table before rushing back to his house. Grumbling, Mingyu eyes the glass – filled with now disgustingly lukewarm water – and sighs.

The tall boy looks around the room, wincing slightly at the mess on the floor. As both him and Minghao were known for their cleanliness, their room was generally quite well kept (which was a drastic contrast from Junhui’s and Wonwoo’s room). However, Seungcheol had been rushing before and could honestly care less about getting a couple shirts on the floor. There were pressing matters at hand, like finding a comfortable pair of shorts for Mingyu. In any case, he hoped Minghao wouldn’t get mad at him for having his clothes all over the ground – although technically, like Seungcheol said, it wasn’t _his_ fault.

He had been working in the kitchen, like always. It was a Friday night, meaning that the culinary students helped out at the local university restaurant. As a student, you were placed into one of four blocks randomly and each block was responsible for the restaurant once a month. Students did everything from prepping ingredients to preparing the menu for the night under the watch of the restaurant’s usual staff. Mingyu had been in charge of chopping the vegetables, and, while walking to the back room to pick up some more plates, had slipped on a patch of water on the ground. It was a combination of negligence and bad luck (as the student who spilled said water came back two seconds later with a caution sign), but it had resulted in a sprained ankle nonetheless. Mingyu had then been released from kitchen duty, and was picked up by Seungcheol – who was heading home after his last class – and promptly brought back home and banished to his bed for rest.

Mingyu didn’t really blame Seungcheol for leaving him, a sickly Jeonghan was a whiny, needy Jeonghan, and Jisoo had been taking care of him for the majority of the day since the other boy didn’t have any classes on Fridays. It was only fair for Seungcheol to take his turn in becoming a punching bag for the long haired male. But still, it was a Friday night. None of his housemates were going to be coming home any time soon – they were university students for goodness’ sakes – so that left a bed ridden Mingyu bored out of his mind, he couldn’t really do anything to amuse himself, unless he managed to drag himself out of bed, and _that_ definitely wasn’t happening.

Grumbling, Mingyu gives up and takes a sip of water before looking over to Minghao’s side of the room. Minghao’s bed was quite simple, basic white pillows along with a light blue comforter. There were no patterns to his bed sheet, and his desk was just as neat. Colour coded folders for each of classes were piled on top of each other while a variety of different coloured pens and pencils were neatly stacked in a box. It was quaint, but very much like Minghao. The other boy wasn’t one for flashy things, at least, not in terms of his environment. His fashion style however, was another thing altogether.

Letting his eyes trail from Minghao’s bed to his closet, Mingyu smirks at the flash of bright orange buried between Minghao’s other clothes. He remembered when Minghao had bought the matching orange hat and shirt, Mingyu had been with him that day after all. They had bickering, like always; over various topics when they spotted said shirt on a mannequin. The conversation then moved towards how no one could _possibly_ look good in such a _horrid_ shade of orange, and Minghao, in all his ‘fuck you Mingyu’ fashion, had promptly bought the shirt _and_ the matching hat just to spite the taller boy.

Shaking his head in laughter from the memory, Mingyu leans back into his pillows. Wincing slightly at the pain that shot up from his leg, the giant sighs when he realizes the painkillers were probably fading away. After Seungcheol had picked him up, they had immediately gone to the nurse’s office (which Mingyu always thought was a weird addition to a university campus but, after tonight, he’d learn to start appreciating it a bit more) where Mingyu was given said wrap and a couple pills for the pain. Sentenced to a week of rest, Mingyu was lectured by Seungcheol the whole way home about watching where he was going. Now however, Mingyu wouldn’t have minded a lecture, as long as someone, _anyone_ was there to talk to him. After all, he was injured! That should allow him _some_ sort of condolence right?

Yawning, Mingyu – with great effort – manages to grab one of the pills Seungcheol had left on the counter and swallows it along with a gulp of water. Readjusting the pillows beside him and making sure his foot was still elevated, the bored man ends up falling into a light slumber as the sun sets completely and the streets fill with adults coming home and students going out.

 

Mingyu awakens some time later to a dark room. The only light he could see was seeping through the cracks of the door and from the shuffling he could hear from the other side, Mingyu assumed that at least one of his roommates were home. Opening his mouth to call out, the only sound that escapes is a low whine when he accidentally moves his left leg. The limb falls off the stack of pillows and lands on the bed, causing Mingyu to intake sharply. Eyes welling with tears, Mingyu breathes out slowly as he bears the pain. Slowly, as the sharp feeling in his leg goes away, Mingyu attempts to bring his foot back up but ends up yelping as another wave of pain hits him.

“Mingyu!” the door slams open mere seconds later, shocking Mingyu as he looks up to see three figures hurtling towards him in the dark. Blinking in confusion, the surprise on his face soon turns to happiness when Junhui immediately appears at his side. Minghao stands by the end of the bed, biting his lip nervously as his slender fingers hover above Mingyu’s hurt ankle while Wonwoo – finally realizing they couldn’t see shit – goes back to the door in order to turn on the lights. As light floods into the room, Mingyu looks around to see the mutually panicked yet relieved look on everyone’s face. Summoning a smile, Mingyu grins at the three other boys as Wonwoo walks back towards his bed.

“I thought you guys were going to be out late today,” Mingyu states as Junhui leans over to adjust the pillows. Sitting up with his help, Mingyu also manages to get his foot back onto the pile of pillows along with Minghao’s assistance.

“And leave you alone with an injury like this?” Wonwoo scoffs, sarcasm unable to hide the genuine worry on his face as he forces a pill into Mingyu’s hands.

“It’s not that bad,” Mingyu replies. “Just a sprain.”

“Seungcheol hyung said you bruised yourself when you fell too,” Minghao comments softly, still standing at the edge of the bed. He looks up at Mingyu before pouting slightly and looking away. “You should have been more careful.”

“It wasn’t my fault Hao,” Mingyu sighs, slightly miffed that Minghao seemed to be blaming him. He didn’t want to victimize himself, but honestly, there wasn’t anything Mingyu could have done to evade the puddle. Sure, he wasn’t looking where he was going but if Mingyu didn’t slip in it, someone else would’ve. An accident had been unavoidable.

“I never said it was–” Minghao starts before he’s shushed by a sharp look from Junhui.

“ _Xiao Hao_ go check if we locked the door when we came home,” Junhui says calmly, but from his tone, it was obvious that he wouldn’t take no for an answer.

“ _Ge I didn’t mean it like that_ ,” Minghao mutters back in Mandarin, eyes flickering between looking at Junhui, Mingyu, and the floor near his feet.

“ _Doesn’t matter, go,_ ” Junhui replies back, leaving Mingyu to look between both foreign males confusedly. Wonwoo sighs, having learnt basic Mandarin back in high school, and steps over to Minghao’s side.

“Come on Hao, Mingyu’s probably hungry, let’s go make something huh?” Wonwoo offers gently, putting a hand on Minghao’s shoulder. He slowly guides the younger boy out of the room, whispering different recipes and ingredients the whole way, before he closes the door behind him.

“They’re going to burn the house down,” Mingyu comments after they leave. He looks over at Junhui, who took a spot on the bed beside Mingyu, before glancing back at the door. “Minghao didn’t have to go,” Mingyu says haltingly.

“Someone had to check on the door, we were all in a rush when we came home,” Junhui replies, ignoring the guilty look Mingyu sent his way. “Don’t feel so bad, none of this is your fault.”

“I never said it was,” Mingyu says.

“But you sure look like you think it was,” Junhui laughs. “We came home because Jisoo hyung sent us a text. Well, technically, Seungcheol hyung told Jisoo hyung what happened when he came home and then Jeonghan hyung overheard so he immediately texted Minghao.”

“Jisoo hyung was the one who reminded Seungcheol to put my medicine on the table,” Mingyu states thoughtfully.

“Well he’s the one in nursing,” Junhui shrugs before leaning over to fix Mingyu’s dishevelled hair. “Minghao was the first one to know – about your injury I mean.”

“Hm?” Mingyu replies, enjoying the gentle way Junhui’s hands moved through his hair.

“Jeonghan hyung texted him first and he’s the one who told us. And you know him; he tends to think about the worst case scenario first. It doesn’t help that Jeonghan hyung merely told him that ‘you hurt yourself in the kitchen’. That could’ve been anything from a cut to a third degree burn in Minghao’s eyes,” Junhui explains. “Basically, he was really worried. We all were of course, but Minghao was practically frantic when we got home.”

“Sorry for worrying you,” Mingyu mutters, guilty that he had affected his other three housemates so much. “I didn’t mean to.”

“Of course you didn’t,” Junhui rolls his eyes. “If you had hurt yourself on purpose in order to receive more attention from us I’d make sure to kick your ass and land you in a real hospital.” Mingyu grins, shaking his head to indicate that, though he was a bit needy in terms of attention and affection, he would never openly put himself in harm’s way in order to receive more of it. “Cool, now I’m going to go see if they’re really cooking or if they’re burning the house down, think you can stand being alone for a couple minutes?” Junhui teases, standing up.

“I’ll be fine hyung,” Mingyu scoffs as he feels Junhui’s weight leave the bed.

“That’s what they all say,” Junhui replies before leaning over to press a kiss onto Mingyu’s lips. Grinning at the act of affection, Mingyu closes his eyes as Junhui leaves the room. Listening intently, Mingyu hears Junhui’s footsteps head towards the kitchen, where his distinct voice immediately bursts out laughing. Pouting at the fact that he couldn’t see what Junhui was laughing at, Mingyu hears a disgruntled comment from Minghao while Wonwoo joins Junhui in his giggling. Smiling at that, Mingyu leans back and relaxes as, eventually, the clatter in the kitchen turns into soft whispering.

“How are you feeling?” the doors opens around ten minutes later, just as Mingyu was about to doze off. Opening his eyes tiredly, Mingyu smiles gently at the sight of Wonwoo, and sits up once again. Wonwoo steps around the pile of clothes on the floor and puts a glass of water on the table seeing as Mingyu had finished the glass Seungcheol had give him.

“Like shit,” Mingyu grins, showing his canines as Wonwoo smiles softly.

“Don’t let Jeonghan hyung hear that, he’ll cry when he knows his little babies are swearing,” Wonwoo teases, adjusting the blanket around Mingyu’s midsection. Frowning at how crumpled the taller boy’s shirt was, Wonwoo begins to pull it down in an attempt to straighten it out.

“What? You don’t think I look hot?” Mingyu smirks, patting his stomach proudly. Flushing slightly at that, Wonwoo responds with a sharp slap to Mingyu’s shoulder before managing to fix the blankets _and_ Mingyu’s shirt.

“Shut up,” Wonwoo replies simply.

“Anyways, Jeonghan hyung swears like a sailor so he’s not really allowed to judge,” Mingyu comments. “I swear he’s even made up a few curses himself.”

“Regardless,” Wonwoo snorts at Mingyu’s statement before attempting to change the conversation topic (despite Mingyu’s eye roll at his lack of tact). “Are you going to be fine staying at home for the week? Do your other professors know that you won’t be able to go to class?”

“Who said I’m not going to class?” Mingyu says slowly, eyebrows knitting together in confusion. “I can rest this weekend and then get to class on crutches can I not? Even then, it's a sprain, it's not that serious.”

“Mingyu,” Wonwoo starts off seriously, trying to control his face as Mingyu pouts at him immediately. The other boy pulls a puppy face, eyes wide and practically sparkling while his lower lip trembled slightly. “Don’t do that,” Wonwoo glares, “did you even go to the doctor? How do you know you didn’t fracture something instead of simply spraining it? What if it gets worse because you push yourself too hard? Did you even think of stuff like that?”

“Calm down hyung,” Mingyu reaches over to pat Wonwoo’s cheek with his hand. He brushes his thumb over the expanse of the elder’s cheek and playfully runs it over Wonwoo’s lips as well. “I’ll be fine, if it really does hurt come Sunday then I’ll see what I can do in terms of contacting my professors. But for now, let’s keep a positive attitude okay? Isn’t that what they say is the best cure? Optimism or something along those lines?”

“I’ve literally never heard someone say that,” Wonwoo laughs a bit, air escaping his lips and warming the tip of Mingyu’s finger. Raising an arm to pull Mingyu’s hand away from his face, Wonwoo intertwines their fingers together instead and firmly clasps their hands together. “But you have to promise okay? Don’t lie to yourself and pretend that it doesn’t hurt. We’re always here to take care of you if you can’t remember?”

“Gotcha,” Mingyu winks childishly, before using his free hand to form a pinky promise with Wonwoo. Smirking sneakily, Wonwoo barely catches the glint in Mingyu’s eyes before the taller male pulls Wonwoo towards him with both his hands. Letting out a surprised grunt, Wonwoo falls forwards, practically landing in Mingyu’s lap, while Mingyu places a victorious kiss onto Wonwoo’s unsuspecting lips.

“You’re infuriating,” Wonwoo grumbles. The slender boy eventually regains his balance by (embarrassingly) placing both of his arms on Mingyu’s neck while Mingyu wraps his arm around Wonwoo’s waist.

“You’re too skinny,” Mingyu furrows his eyebrows, squeezing Wonwoo’s middle experimentally. “Have you been eating?”

“Every day, three meals a day,” Wonwoo rolls his eyes. “I get lectured enough by Junhui and you to know I’m not allowed to skip meals – not that I ever did. Which reminds me, I was snacking with Minghao the other day and we found this really awesome sashimi place.”

“Why do you get to go around on food dates with Minghao?” Mingyu pouts. “I want to come too, I could’ve learned something!”

“Because, like you said, we're too skinny,” Wonwoo rolls his eyes. “You can come next time then. That reminds me, Minghao wants to talk to you next,” Wonwoo clambers off of Mingyu’s lap, causing the younger male to pout once again at the loss of heat. Smacking Mingyu’s shoulder at his childish behaviour, Wonwoo kisses the injured man on the cheek before sauntering out of the room.

As Wonwoo opens the door, Mingyu looks over and meets the slightly scared yet determined eyes of Minghao. The other boy had been awkwardly standing outside his room, waiting for Wonwoo to finish his moment with Mingyu. Patting Minghao on the shoulder, Wonwoo glances back at Mingyu for a second before pushing the Chinese male forwards and shutting the door behind him. Stumbling into the room, Minghao practically trips over the clothes on the floor – just managing to catch himself thanks to his fast reflexes. Furrowing his eyebrows at the mess, Minghao sends Mingyu a judgemental look before leaning over to clean it up.

“Seungcheol was looking for shorts,” Mingyu speaks up. “I was going to clean it later; you don’t have to do it now.” Minghao sighs gently, turning away from Mingyu in order to hang up his sweaters. Wordlessly cleaning up the rest of the mess, Minghao walks towards Mingyu with his head facing downwards – bringing the exact opposite mood than the others had. While Junhui and Wonwoo had been full of teasing lectures and good natures, Minghao walked with an air of dread and seriousness, something Mingyu was not used to seeing coming from the naturally cute and bickering Minghao.

“It’s not your fault,” Minghao says quietly, voice wavering when he accidentally makes eye contact with a puzzled Mingyu. The Chinese boy stops a couple centimetres away from Mingyu, biting his lip nervously as he returns his eyes back towards the ground. “I’m sorry.”

“Why are you apologizing?” Mingyu asks, clearly flabbergasted at the situation. Honestly, _he_ should have been the one apologizing – having worried all three roommates as well as causing them so much trouble.

Rather than answer his question, Minghao looks over to his side of the room, continuing to gnaw on his bottom lip roughly. The boy fiddles with the hem of his shirt, not sure what to do with himself. From the way he stayed rooted in his spot, it was obvious Minghao walked into the room with a purpose, but right now, the boy had absolutely no idea how to go around completing his task. He had, at first, refused to go into the room, but after multiple pep talks from both Junhui and Wonwoo, Minghao eventually relented. Now however, with no annoyingly optimistic Junhui or silently comforting Wonwoo by his side, Minghao was at a loss.

“Stop biting on your lip, you’ll hurt yourself,” Mingyu speaks up, cutting through Minghao’s thoughts and clearing his mind. He looks up at the giant, and is met with open arms. Using his long limbs, Mingyu leans over with great difficulty and manages to grab onto Minghao’s sleeve. Pulling him inwards, Minghao stumbles closer to the bed until he was forced to sit. Once his goal of capturing Minghao was completed, Mingyu rests back into his nest of pillows and taps Minghao’s lips once again as a reminder. “Stop it,” Mingyu says once more, and Minghao relents his nibbling. “Now why are you sorry?”

“Because I blamed you,” Minghao starts, voice small in the large expanse of the silent room. “Even though it wasn’t your fault, and I knew it wasn’t your fault, but I blamed you and then Junnie hyung got mad at me and even Wonwoo hyung scolded me after we left.” Raising an eyebrow at Minghao’s odd reasoning, Mingyu stays quiet as Minghao takes a deep breath and instead wraps his larger hand around the Chinese boy’s slender digits.

“Seungcheol hyung already told me it wasn’t you fault, it couldn’t have been prevented,” Minghao continues. “But a part of me kept saying why you couldn’t have watched out, why weren’t you a bit less clumsy, why didn’t someone else slip first. I don’t like those thoughts, but they’re intrusive, and I was... I was worried Mingyu.” Minghao pauses slightly in embarrassment, peeking up through his fringe to see Mingyu smile reassuringly back at him.

“I know that, I don’t exactly show how much I like you, love you even maybe – stop smirking at me. All I do is bicker with you and call you names. I don’t have history with you like Wonwoo hyung does. I can’t play around and wrestle with you like Junnie hyung does. All I do is sit there and make fun of you and that’s not even what I really want to do but every time I want to say something to you it comes out as an insult or a joke and I don’t know what to do,” Minghao lowers his head further until Mingyu can no longer see his eyes. He can feel the trembling of Minghao’s hand though, so he tightens his grip on the other and pulls him closer, until the smaller male is nestled into Mingyu’s side.

“You know I don’t mind,” Mingyu says softly, as if he was talking to an injured animal. “Everyone shows their feelings differently, and the way you do it is just a bit unique. I know you don’t mean what you say, I know that when you say, ‘ _you look ugly in that shirt put something else on_ ’ you really mean ‘ _it’s cold outside and you’re not going to survive in just that shirt_ ’. I’m not stupid Hao, a little oblivious at times, but definitely not stupid. I can figure out what you really mean, even if you don’t say it.”

“So don’t worry about it,” Mingyu rubs his hand up and down Minghao’s back comfortingly, smiling inwardly when the other boy seems to relax into his hold. “You worry a lot Hao, I know. Not only over me, but for Wonwoo hyung and Junhui hyung as well. And then you don’t tell anyone about it. You’re too sensitive, too soft spoken for your own good at times Hao, but that’s where we come in.”

“You’re about to say something cheesy,” Minghao sniffs, looking up and meeting Mingyu’s eyes confidently since the first time he walked into the room. “You’re going to say something about how we all complete each other and balance our weaknesses and strengths and I’m not going to let you because I’m already cringing.”

“Fine,” Mingyu pouts, and when Minghao giggles slightly at the sight, he feels his heart soar with happiness. “As long as you stop keeping these things to yourself – talk to us Hao.”

“Alright,” Minghao nestled his head into the crook of Mingyu’s shoulder and smiles into the other’s neck. “I’ll talk so much you’ll wish I would shut up.”

“I already wish you’d shut up,” Mingyu replies back, laughing when Minghao slaps his thigh. “Hey! I’m injured! You’re supposed to be nice to me and spoil me and stuff.”

“Junhui hyung and Wonwoo hyung spoil you enough daily,” Minghao rolls his eyes. “But this weekend, I guess you’ll be spoiled three times as much.”

“Wonderful,” Mingyu smiles when Minghao sits up to look at him. Leaning forwards, he lands a kiss onto Minghao’s lips. Moving his hands towards the small of Minghao’s back, he feels the smaller boy respond by sneaking his arms around Mingyu’s neck and into his hair as the kiss deepens. Breaking apart, Mingyu smirks down as Minghao takes in a deep breath, eyes wide and cheeks faintly blushed before speaking, “you better spoil me rotten then.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The chapter summary makes this sound like smut but I don't know how to write smut- That won't stop me from trying later on tho... ALSO THIS WAS SUPPOSED TO BE FLUFFY BUT IT ENDED OFF ANGSTY I DUNNO.
> 
> Inspired by Mingyu's recent injury. ;A; At least he went to Japan with the rest of Seventeen~ Also first non Minghao-centric chapter would you look at that?
> 
> Also would you guys like another story kind of like this but based on Jihancheol or do you want me to integrate them into this one?
> 
>   
> Hope you're smiling!  
> 
> 
>   
> ~ alateni  
> 


	5. liar liar

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Wonwoo and Minghao have some time to themselves, like they always do on Thursdays, so they set off on a routine that's not entirely new to them at all.

“I want to eat sashimi,” Minghao pouts, leaning forwards to scratch his calf before collapsing back into the couch. His legs were hanging off one arm of the piece of furniture while his torso was casually lying across the other half of said couch.

“I’m allergic to seafood,” Wonwoo answers from his spot on the floor. The other boy was relaxing stomach down beside Minghao, nose buried in a book and round glasses perched precariously on his nose.

“You don’t have to come,” Minghao whines, shifting a bit.

“Hao the whole point of this is for us to eat somewhere together,” Wonwoo rolls his eyes. He adjusts his glasses, pushing them further up on his nose, before trying to find his spot in the book again. “What’s the point if we’re just going to eat at separate restaurants?”

“Maybe we can find a place that serves sashimi and like, not good food,” Minghao drawls watching as a fly makes its way across the room. Someone must’ve forgotten to close their window. Probably Mingyu.

“Food that isn’t seafood isn’t ‘not good food’ Hao,” Wonwoo chuckles lowly. “You like food that isn’t seafood! Like beef!”

“But _everyone_ likes beef,” Minghao rolls over and lets his arm drop down. His fingers skitter across the cool wooden boards as he sighs. It was too hot to be arguing but Minghao was bored so argue on he did. “And besides, right now, I want to eat seafood, so anything else that _isn’t_ seafood is bad.”

“I’m sure vegans don’t like beef,” Wonwoo states, closing his book. While the two males had been previously just lounging around the living room, now that they were talking there was no way Wonwoo would be able to read. He wasn’t a genius after all, he either read and ignored everyone else in the room or he would talk and end up rereading the same line sixty thousand times.

“Vegans also don’t like happiness,” Minghao snorts.

“That’s offensive,” Wonwoo replies.

“You’re _face_ is offensive,” Minghao retorts. Ignoring Wonwoo’s snort, the Chinese male stretches in his spot, sliding further into the couch until his shirt rode up and he probably had a million double chins. Minghao looks over at the clock, noting that it was a bit late to be called lunchtime, before yawning. “Well we have to decide on _something_.”

Before Wonwoo could reply, the door opens with a loud _creak_ and the two roommates sit up to look at the newcomer. Junhui smiles at the two of them, hair in a mess and dark eye bags under his eyes, before he immediately ducks into the kitchen – no doubt searching for coffee or some other caffeinated drink. Groaning at the sudden rush of blood, Minghao settles back into the couch while Wonwoo places his precious book on the table. The older boy massages the bridge of his nose – his glasses had left marks – before Junhui reappears at the door, this time with a cup of coffee in his hands

"Where are you going?” Wonwoo inquires as Junhui fumbles around his pockets. “Want to come eat lunch with Minghao and I?”

“It’s 2 in the afternoon,” Junhui snorts absentmindedly. “It’s far too late for lunch.”

“Yet here we are, deciding what to eat. So beat that!” Minghao mumbles lazily, his face half hidden by the couch pillows.

“That doesn’t make sense Hao but okay,” Wonwoo laughs gently, leaning over and poking Minghao’s exposed belly with a long finger before the other boy yelps and backs away from Wonwoo’s offending appendage.

“I can’t, I have another class in thirty minutes and then a tutorial that’s worth attendance marks,” Junhui all but pouts, whining lightly to Wonwoo and Minghao. Wonwoo sends Junhui an apologetic smile, luckily for him, Minghao and him didn’t have any classes today so they were free to laze around. Thursdays were always a free day for the both of them, but it seems like it was the opposite for their roommates. Junhui was out of the house by 7 in the morning and didn’t come home until after 5 while Mingyu was preoccupied by his own classes. Culinary students always had assessments on Fridays so Thursdays were spent testing and preparing, meaning Mingyu wasn’t home all day (although luckily, this freed up his Friday as that was his only activity).

“Aw,” Minghao says non-commitedly, distracted by a piece of fluff on his clothes. Rolling his eyes at Minghao’s lack of soul, Junhui waves Wonwoo goodbye before leaving again for university. Laughing softly, Wonwoo rests his elbows on the couch, catching Minghao’s attention again, before speaking.

“Let’s go get pizza, I’m in the mood for sweet potato,” Wonwoo suggests, patting Minghao’s thigh. The Chinese male turns to give Wonwoo a contemplative gaze before nodding and sitting up perkily. “Awesome, I heard about this new place from Jihoon and they have fried chicken too.”

“Fuck yes,” Minghao licks his lips, stomach grumbling at the sound of greasy food, before the boy disappears into his room to change into something that wasn’t a ratty old t-shirt that he was pretty sure was Junhui’s in the first place. Soon enough, the two boys are outside of the apartment – for once – and with Minghao locking up and Wonwoo texting Jihoon for the pizza parlour’s address, they exit the building.

“The place isn’t too far,” Wonwoo says, looking up from his phone. “If it’s good enough we can start ordering delivery from there.”

“Then Mingyu will stop complaining about how we get to eat cool food on our outings or whatever,” Minghao rolls his eyes, pulling Wonwoo away from the road as a particularly fast car races past. “He was whining to me about it the other day – about how he’s stuck eating leftovers and we get to go out and explore.”

“I thought he was mad because he thinks he can cook food better than the kind we eat outside,” Wonwoo blinks, lacing his fingers into Minghao’s after the younger boy refused to let go of his hand. He swings his arm, and, in turn, Minghao’s as well, and they set off at a leisurely pace.

Since the two didn’t have anything to do on Thursday, they had developed a routine of waking up late and exploring the nearby neighbourhoods – and sometimes further if they woke up earlier – for good food spots. It had started as an assignment for Wonwoo, he had been required to keep a weekly blog for one of his literature classes and update it for a semester. Thus, after being roped along by Minghao to try out a new cafe near the university campus, Wonwoo had begun to write restaurant reviews and food posts on his blog. Even after the project finished (with Wonwoo receiving a high eighty for his efforts), the two males continued scouting new spots. Wonwoo called it field work, Minghao called it an outing, Junhui called it a food date and Mingyu was just jealous they didn’t think his cooking was good enough – mind you, neither of them had said anything along those lines but Mingyu was adamant in his opinion.

“Here we are,” Wonwoo declares, stopping in front of a quaint, retro pizza place. Leading Minghao in, Wonwoo pushes the door open and smiles as the old timey bell rings from the top of the door.  Wonwoo’s eyes travel around the restaurant before a girl behind the counter waves at them.

“Hey there, welcome to _WM Pizza Parlour_ , just sit anywhere we don’t have a lot of clients right now, I’ll be with you in a minute!” the girl calls, gesturing around the place, before disappearing into the kitchen. Choosing to sit at one of the booths near the window, Minghao takes his DSLR camera out and starts snapping pictures of the restaurant’s interior. Another reason as to why Wonwoo went out with Minghao a lot to try out new food spots, the Chinese boy had an interest in photography since he was a kid and, although he hadn’t been allowed to major in photography, learned a lot of things by himself through online resources.

“Hi, I’m your waitress, Mimi, nice to meet you!” another girl appears at their table a couple minutes later. She grins at them as she places down two menus before pointing at her nametag.

“Hello, where’s the other girl from before?” Wonwoo asks curiously.

“Oh Seunghee?” Mimi confirms. “She’s usually on cashier and take-out duty so that’s not her job. YooA, Arin, and I are usually the ones waiting on customers.”

“Yoo...ah?” Minghao tries, tripping over the unfamiliar word.

“YooA,” Mimi says slowly and clearly. “Some of us don’t go by our real names here, I don’t know why – the manager likes it that way,” Mimi shrugs causing Wonwoo to smile. “Only Seunghee, Jiho, and Hyojung go by their real names – and Jiho is usually on delivery duty so you won’t see her unless you call for that.”

“Noted,” Wonwoo nods before Mimi leaves so they can talk about their order. Pouring over the menu, the two boys eventually decide to grab a medium sweet potato pizza and two orders of fried chicken for themselves and another large delicacy pizza to go for Mingyu and Junhui when they got home. Soon enough, another girl swings around to take their order.

“Hey, Mimi is taking a phone call so I’m filling in,” the girl says cheerfully. She brushes her bangs out of her face before taking a notepad and pencil out of her pockets. “What’ll it be?”

“How many people work here YooA ssi?” Wonwoo asks after ordering. The girl, YooA as it read from her nametag, tucks her pencil back into her apron before answering.

“Around twenty? I’m not too sure actually. It’s mostly eight of us that work here though, the others fill in every so often or work in the kitchen,” YooA answers. “The boss likes to keep things small and family like so we all know each other.”

“Your boss also seems to like to only hire female workers?” Minghao points out, seeing as the three staff members they had seen from their visit had been entirely female.

“Oh no, the boys are out today, at some MT for the university I think. At least, that’s what C.NU oppa said,” YooA shrugs. “You guys wanted the _Liar Liar delicacy pizza_ by the way right?”

“Yeah,” Minghao nods. “Interesting name.”

“The boss is weird, it’s ‘cause it rhymes. _Liar Liar_ from _WM pizza parlour_ ,” YooA snorts. “Anyways, I’ll be back soon with your food, enjoy yourselves until then!” With that, the female walks away into the kitchen where giggling and shouts are soon heard. Looking at Minghao in slight concern, the Chinese male merely shrugs before fishing his phone out and checking his messages. Feeling a _buzz_ in his own pocket, Wonwoo takes his phone and looks down only to snort in disbelief.

“Seriously? I’m right here,” Wonwoo says, looking down at the group chat.

“Yeah but I know Junnie hyung gets bored during class and I haven’t talked to the others in a while too,” Minghao mutters before looking back at his screen.

 

**_Soonyoung is an idiot : 7 members_ **

**_Hao:_ ** _Jihoon hyung the pizza place u recommended is weird  
_ (2:01 PM)

 **_Wonu:_ ** _intriguing  
_ (read 1//2:01 PM)

 _He means intriguing  
_ (read 1//2:01 PM)

 **_Hao:_ ** _no I don’t why don’t they go by real names  
_ (2:02 PM)

 _That’s weird  
_ (2:02 PM)

 **_Soon:_ ** _it’s cool!  
_ (2:04 PM)

 _Right?  
_ (2:04 PM)

 _Like codenames or something  
_ (2:04 PM)

 _MAYBE THEY’RE SPIES  
_ (2:05 PM)

 **_Jihoon:_ ** _Soonyoung you’re an idiot  
_ (2:05 PM)

 _And the food is good don’t complain  
_ (2:06 PM)

 **_Jun:_ ** _you guys are trying out a new pizza place??  
_ (2:08 PM)

 _What??  
_ (2:08 PM)

 _I wanna come  
_ (2:08 PM)

 **_Wonu:_ ** _bro  
_ (read 4//2:08 PM)

 _We asked you  
_ (read 4//2:09 PM)

 _And you went off to school instead  
_ (read 4//2:09 PM)

 **_Soon:_ ** _lol what a nerd  
_ (2:10 PM)

 **_Jun:_ ** _shut the fuck up soonyoung  
_ (2:14 PM)

 _Who do you think you are  
_ (2:14 PM)

 _Going by soon  
_ (2:14 PM)

 _Like what the fuck is that  
_ (2:14 PM)

 **_Soon:_ ** _you’re just jealous you don’t get a super cool nickname  
_ (2:14 PM)

 **_Jihoon:_ ** _technically ‘jun’ is a nickname  
_ (2:15 PM)

 **_Soon:_ ** _shh! Whose side are you on??  
_ (2:15 PM)

 **_Jihoon:_ ** _definitely not yours that’s what  
_ (2:16 PM)

 

“Hey, sorry to bother you again but what kind of drinks do you want?” Mimi appears again, placing down some napkins on the table.

“Cider is fine for the both of us,” Wonwoo replies seeing as Minghao was still looking at his phone. Mimi nods, bids the two farewell, before leaving again. Soon afterwards, YooA comes out with their pizza. Placing it on the table, she warns them that it’s still hot before going off to grab the rest of their order. Waiting as Minghao takes his camera out again for some quick shots of the food, Wonwoo and Minghao dig in – but not before sending said picture to the group chat first. After feasting, Minghao looks down at his phone again while Wonwoo pays for the meal.

 

**_Soonyoung is an idiot : 7 members_ **

**_Hao:_ ** _[sent an image]  
_ (2:24 PM)

 **_Soon:_ ** _damn that looks good  
_ (2:31 PM)

 **_Jihoon:_ ** _soonyoung you literally ate thirty minutes ago  
_ (2:32 PM)

 **_Soon:_ ** _it still looks good tho  
_ (2:32 PM)

 **_Gyu:_ ** _you guys better be bringing food home  
_ (2:46 PM)

 _Im not cooking dinner  
_ (2:46 PM)

 _Ive been staring at tiramisu for the last four hours wondering how to incorporate it with my dish  
_ (2:46 PM)

 _I didn’t know we had to use tiramisu  
_ (2:46 PM)

 _The world hates me  
_ (2:46 PM)

 **_Hao:_ ** _calm down ming #2  
_ (read 3//2:53 PM)

 _We’re bringing some home  
_ (read 3//2:53 PM)

 **_Gyu:_ ** _why am i ming #2  
_ (2:55 PM)

 _I was born first  
_ (2:55 PM)

 **_Hao:_ ** _does it look like i care  
_ (read 3//2:56 PM)

 **_Soon:_ ** _lol  
_ (2:58 PM)

 _Get rekt mingyu  
_ (2:58 PM)

 **_Gyu:_ ** _fuck off soonyoung  
_ (3:00 PM)

 **_Soon:_ ** _excuse me!  
_ (3:00 PM)

 _D:  
_ (:00 PM)

 _I’m your hyung!  
_ (3:01 PM)

 _Where’s my respect??  
_ (3:01 PM)

 **_Jihoon:_ ** _it left you  
_ (3:03 PM)

 _Like we all should’ve a long time ago  
_ (3:03 PM)

 **_Soon:_ ** _everyone is so mean  
_ (3:05 PM)

 

“Are you done bullying Mingyu and Soonyoung now?” Wonwoo asks, balancing the take out box in his left hand and his phone in his right.

“Jihoon was being mean too,” Minghao says, slipping his phone into his pocket and taking the box from Wonwoo. Rolling his eyes, Wonwoo tucks his own cellular decide into his pants before the two leave the restaurant. Casually strolling back towards their apartment, the two converse about random topics. From the cat Wonwoo saw last week to the upcoming test Minghao was sure he was going to fail, until they quieted down into a calm silence. Things didn’t seem awkward or uncomfortable though, they never did. After all, Minghao had known Wonwoo the longest out of all of his housemates. They had first met in the library when Minghao was still clueless about Korean culture and didn’t know the wonders of kimchi so it was only natural for the two to be just as comfortable in silence as they were talking.

Unlike their other halves, Minghao and Wonwoo were the more passive types. Introverted rather than extraverted, it was nice to bask in the company of someone else that shared their views on social interaction – the less of it the better. It’s not like they didn’t like going out and be friendly, but compared to their peers, they weren’t as sociable. They were usually in the background. Attracting attention, but not quite at the forefront of the scene like Junhui and Mingyu usually was. Then again, once you got to know Junhui and Mingyu, you’d find out that they weren’t extremely outgoing either, but that’s a story for another time.

Entering the apartment, Wonwoo tosses his keys into the bowl near the door as Minghao places the pizza on the counter. It was around 3:30, so the other members of the household wouldn’t be home until later. That didn’t bother either one of the males however, and they immediately went into their respective rooms to change into more comfortable clothing. Coming back out, Wonwoo walks over to Mingyu and Minghao’s shared room and enters the area seeing as Minghao hadn’t come out. Walking over to Minghao’s bed, the Korean boy stifles a giggle at the sight of the younger male collapsed on the bed. He hadn’t even managed to slide on his pants properly, they hung low on his hips – as if Minghao had given up on them in lieu of a nap. Reaching over, Wonwoo straightens out Minghao's posture as so he wouldn’t wake up with a stiff neck and pulls his pants up as well. Tucking the other boy in, Wonwoo exits the room, finding a pad of paper and a pen, and writes a quick note to their housemates before placing it on top of the pizza. Walking back into the room, Wonwoo turns the lights off and slips under the covers. Curling around the other boy, Wonwoo nuzzles his face into Minghao’s soft hair and feels himself drifting off to sleep as well.

 

_Mingyu, Junhui,_

_They said to heat the pizza in the oven for a couple minutes and it’ll be ready – don’t leave it in too long or else it’ll burn or something, I wasn’t really listening._

_Minghao and I are in his room making you jealous with our skin ship. You’re not allowed in. Losers. :P_

_Wonu_

 

“That dick!” Junhui curses, crumpling the note in his hands angrily. Mingyu immediately bursts into his shared room with Minghao, turning on the lights and immediately diving into Minghao’s bed. Junhui follows soon after, shedding his jacket on the ground carelessly as he joins the messy pile on the bed.

“W-what’s going on?” Minghao blinks tiredly, having been rudely awaken by a body flying into his. He looks around in panic before confirming that it was just his idiotic roommates again before the boy’s head flops back down on the pillow – except he never makes it there because Wonwoo had stolen the pillow in order to fend Junhui off. Sighing, Minghao scoots back as Wonwoo pushes Junhui off the bed. Tucking his knees underneath his chin, the boy watches in amusement as Mingyu ends up throwing the blankets onto Wonwoo as a sort of net before kicking him off the bed as well.

“I’m the king of the castle!” Mingyu declares childishly, waving his arms in a sort of victory dance – until he’s knocked off of the bed by one of Minghao’s legs. Grinning innocently at Mingyu’s betrayed face, Minghao steals the blanket and pillow from the hard floor and snuggles back into the bed. Looking at Wonwoo and Mingyu’s faces, Junhui grins devilishly before jumping back onto the bed. He’s soon followed by the other two housemates and they, once again, start up another messy battle of who knows what.

“Why can’t you just leave me alone?” Minghao finally whines – after the blanket was thrown across the room and Junhui had Mingyu’s face underneath the pillow.

“Hao, the day we leave you alone is the day we die,” Junhui states smartly.

“Yeah? Well that day is going to come real soon if you don’t get off of me _right now_ ,” Mingyu growls from underneath the pillow. Laughing at his predicament, Minghao sighs and melts into Wonwoo’s shoulder as the two watch their housemates battle to the death. His nap could wait for another time, when the house wasn’t shaking in battle cries and there were two flailing adult men in front of him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Whose taller? Minghao or Wonwoo?? This is important to me I must know the heights of my ships- Also I really like the idea of WonHao going on food dates I don't know it's cute? And Wonwoo has a blog that Minghao helps takes pictures for how adorable is that?? I'm dying-
> 
> And yeah I threw in OMG and B1A4. My WM Entertainment feels have been getting to me recently.
> 
>   
> Hope you're smiling!  
> 
> 
>   
> ~ alateni  
> 


	6. i forgot

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It's a certain someone's special day yet things don't always go as planned.

“Hey Hao? Do you like chocolate or vanilla better–”

“Does it matter Mingyu? I was supposed to leave like five minutes ago,” Minghao grumbles in response as Mingyu flinches slightly from his spot in the kitchen. The other, shorter boy was currently running around the living room, attempting to find… something, while Mingyu watches from his haven – otherwise known as the kitchen. “Here it is, fucking shit,” Minghao curses when he finally finds the manila folder laying in between two couch pillows. Picking it up and slipping it quickly into his bag, the boy all but races to get his shoes and on.

“Put on a jacket Hao, it’s cold,” Mingyu reminds softly as Minghao unlocks the door. Said male rolls his eyes and kisses his teeth in annoyance but grabs a coat nevertheless. As the door slams shut, Mingyu smiles in amusement at the fact that, in his haste, Minghao had grabbed Junhui’s jacket, before the smile drops from his face when he realizes Minghao hadn’t eaten breakfast.

Leaning back and resting his hands behind him on the kitchen counter, Mingyu’s face morphs into a concerned yet frustrated expression. Minghao was feeling pretty stressed this week, the incident that had taken place five minutes prior was a prime example of it, and Mingyu felt bad because he couldn’t really do anything about it. Apparently, all of Minghao’s professors had planned their tests and assignments to be due within the same week, causing a frantic Minghao to pull multiple all nighters and to skip meals. Not healthy and slightly hypocritical, as Wonwoo put it, seeing as Minghao was studying nutrition, but there wasn’t anything they could do. Any words of criticism were met with bitter sarcasm, something Minghao was known for, but it manifested to greater levels when the boy was angry or overwhelmed.

And, while all his roommates sympathized for the Chinese male, Mingyu was certain that Minghao felt very much alone. Mingyu didn’t have the same workload as the others did, all he basically did was cook (he did a lot more than that but that’s a story for another time). Junhui was currently off on an internship or something along those lines – Mingyu hadn’t been listening very hard when Junhui was explaining it over pizza because first of all, fresh, hot, _pizza_ from that store Wonwoo and Minghao had discovered down the street, WM or something like that, and second of all… actually that was it, Mingyu didn’t have any excuse other than the fact that he was hungry.

In any case, Junhui and Mingyu weren’t very busy – at least not to the extent Minghao was. Then there was Wonwoo, who was working as a teaching assistant, so he wasn’t home often. Wonwoo was pretty busy himself, with running classes, marking, and holding office hours, but since he wasn’t home to show it, Minghao had – to Mingyu’s apparent knowledge – conveniently equated his absence to not being busy. As such, Mingyu had an ever-growing fear that Minghao felt increasingly isolated and lonely due to his work load and, although the four housemates didn’t have arguments very often, he was starting to take it out on everyone else.

Sighing, Mingyu walks over to the mess Minghao had made from looking for his folder and picks up all the discarded pillows and items on the floor. Putting them back in place, Mingyu frowns when he peeks into his and Minghao’s shared room. Usually, the two of them were quite clean, both liking to clean and organize their things and were often in charge of tidying Wonwoo and Junhui’s room too, but when Minghao was stressed, he began slipping. Opening the door fully, Mingyu slips in and begins picking up the scattered clothes off the floor.

Once he tidied everything and made sure Minghao’s notes were filed and organized the way he liked them (Mingyu had been dragged by the other male more than once in order to keep him company and was adept at being Minghao’s secretary), Mingyu left their room to find Junhui laying around the couch. The elder, like him, had little to no classes today (Mingyu’s professor had actually cancelled class because he forgot the key to the kitchen and was too lazy to go find it or something along those lines) so they were the only ones at home.

“Did Wonwoo take my jacket?” Junhui asks as Mingyu plops onto the couch across from him. He peers at Mingyu through his dishevelled fringe, hair still dripping with moisture from the shower he had taken earlier.

“Minghao took it when he was rushing earlier,” Mingyu responds before motioning for Junhui to come over. Ignoring the elder’s quizzical expression, Mingyu stands up and walks into the bathroom before coming out with a hair dryer. Plugging it in, Junhui finally clues into what Mingyu intended to do and sits in front of the taller man. Turning said dryer on, Mingyu begins to slowly but methodically dry Junhui’s hair, starting from the scalp and heading downwards to where Junhui’s bangs were starting to grow into his eyes.

“Mmm, why didn’t you go into cosmetology again?” Junhui mumbles sleepily as Mingyu runs his hands through his hair, massaging the scalp occasionally as he works on Junhui’s locks.

“I liked to cook more,” Mingyu answers simply, turning the dryer off. Too lazy to get up and grab a brush, Mingyu runs his hands through Junhui’s now fluffy hair, combing through the tangled locks carefully. “Although either way my parents didn’t really like what I chose. Being a chef was just the slightly safer option.”

“But you’re gay,” Junhui points out, leaning back as Mingyu continues to caress his scalp. “You’d be like, the perfect stereotypical homosexual stylist.”

“That’s probably really offensive on multiple levels,” Mingyu snorts at Junhui’s analogy. “But now I’m just the gay chef. Not a great title but I’ll work with it.”

“Lame,” Junhui says simply. “By the way did you manage to ask Hao about the flavours?”

“I tried,” Mingyu sighs, hands stilling in their movements at the thought of Minghao. “But you know, he’s really stressed right now. Totally blew my question off in lieu of finding a folder and then he raced out the door without eating. I practically had to force him to take a jacket with him.”

“He didn’t eat dinner yesterday either,” Junhui frowns. “Said he wanted to fit in some studying at the library and that he’d get take out but he was with Jisoo hyung and Jeonghan hyung and they said he hadn’t eaten anything by the time they left. When I confronted him about it when he got home – at like, 2 AM by the way – he promised me he’d eat a big breakfast.”

“What were you doing up at 2 AM anyways,” Mingyu asks, attempting to get his mind off worrying over Minghao. The other 97-liner was extremely stubborn, and even with three bumbling, motherly housemates he still managed to live life the way he wanted, which was extremely unhealthy. Good intentions went way over Minghao’s head and turned into critical challenges to him in his stressed state, so Mingyu was at a loss over how he could possibly help the other male – even after over a year of living with him.

“Things,” Junhui says vaguely. “Joking, I was preparing. The store I ordered from online is in another country so their time zones are different but I wanted to get the sale right away so I had to wait for the right timing and stuff.”

“That sounds fake but okay,” Mingyu jeers, causing Junhui to roll his eyes and stab Mingyu’s stomach with his elbow. “Ow, is that how you treat your hairdresser?”

“Maybe,” Junhui grins. “What would you know, not like you ever take me to the salon.”

“Because I can just cut and style or dye your hair here!” Mingyu whines. “You guys never let me do anything for you, instead you go off and waste money. It would be so much easier if you let me do it.”

“Really? Let you cook, clean, style, and fix everything for us? Would we even have to leave the house Mingyu?” Junhui rolls his eyes. “A bit possessive don’t you think?” Junhui turns around, poking Mingyu’s cheek happily.

“Says you,” Mingyu huffs, crossing his arms. “You’re basically wrapped around Wonwoo hyung or Minghao whenever we’re out – like a vine around a wall.”

“Wow, similes,” Junhui teases. “Learning stuff from Wonwoo I see.”

“Speaking of Wonwoo hyung,” Mingyu ignores Junhui’s obvious jab at his intelligence – Mingyu was quite smart mind you, it’s just, for some reason, Minghao, Junhui, and Wonwoo all though they were smarter than him – and changes the topic. “Do you know if he managed to pick up the flowers?”

“Not sure, I’ll text him later,” Junhui shrugs. “Hopefully Minghao will actually come home on time today so our planning doesn’t go to waste.”

“His last test and presentation is today,” Mingyu thinks. “I think he has a mock patient consultation to do in a couple days but from what I know he was supposed to have handed in his outline and diagnosis yesterday so he should be home free.”

“Let’s count on it then,” Junhui sighs. “No use in worrying now though, I’m sleepy since you oh-so-helpfully blow dried my hair so I’m going back to bed.”

“You literally just woke up?” Mingyu states, although he phrases it more like a question. Looking up at the clock, the younger one scoffs as Junhui stands up. “It’s almost noon.”

“Does this mean you’re not going to join me?” Junhui raises an eyebrow, and laughs when Mingyu jumps at the offer. The two bicker lightly all the way to Junhui’s bed and collapse in a fit of cuddles and giggles. Even as Mingyu closes his eyes to sleep however, he can’t help but feel a small bit of worry growing inside him. He hoped Minghao would be able to make it until the end of the day.

 

“Should I use APA or MLA citations?” the slightly nervous but very much try hard first year student looks up at Wonwoo with large eyes and a certain innocence that the deep voiced male couldn’t help but pity.

“Either is fine, as long as you’re consistent,” Wonwoo replies, watching as the student scribbles down his words in her little notebook. She checks a box off, and as she adjusts the strap of her bag, Wonwoo practically faints at the list of the other questions she was planning on asking him. Drumming his fingers on the desk as she launches another million simple yet irritating questions on him, Wonwoo can’t help but peek over at the clock in his office to see when he’d be able to leave.

Being a teaching assistant wasn't that bad, he got paid for it, which was a major bonus, and sometimes class was genuinely fun to teach. Marking was a bit annoying, especially when he got people knocking on his office because they think they’re the next Shakespeare even though they didn’t know the difference between a metaphor and a simile, but at the end of the day, Wonwoo would say he was one of the more pleasant TA’s. Nothing like the TA across the hall from his office, who was notorious for being a harsh marker and a rude person in general – but only to students. Based on what little experience Wonwoo had with the guy, the dude seemed like a genuinely nice guy. Maybe he just had a personal vendetta against innocent first years who came asking how they should go about their conclusion before they had even read the damn instructions.

“And one more thing,” the girl in front of Wonwoo continued, causing Wonwoo’s left eye to twitch. He resists the urge to roll his eyes as the first-year flips to another page in her book and looks down the list, obviously wondering what question she should ask first. Just as she’s about to open her mouth however, the clock chimes, signalling the blessed arrival of 5 PM – otherwise known as the end to Wonwoo’s office hours.

“Sorry, I have somewhere to be,” Wonwoo stands up abruptly. He wasn’t normally a rude person, but this girl – whatever her name was, Wonwoo had never been good with names – had been in his office for over an hour and a half now and Wonwoo still had mountains of papers to mark as well as almost a million text messages from Mingyu and Junhui to answer. He didn’t have time for another meaningless question about _paragraph spacing_. “You can come in tomorrow when my office hours are open or email me later today, thanks for coming out.”

Practically crying in relief when the student huffs in indignation before leaving his office, Wonwoo stands up and stretches instead. Letting out a happy groan that was a tad too high pitched for his liking, Wonwoo cracks his back multiple times – feeling very much like the old man Minghao teased him to be – before checking his phone.

**_ Super Secret Stuff: 3 members _ **

**_Junnie:_** _yo  
_ (4:27 PM)

 _Wonu_  
(4:30 PM)

 _bro  
_ (4:45 PM)

 _answer me  
_ (4:52 PM)

 **_Wonu:_ ** _you’re so needy like actually?  
_ (read 1//5:02 PM)

 _I was tending to the new generation_  
(read 1//5:02 PM)

 _cultivating their minds and bestowing upon them the knowledge of their ancestors_  
(read 1//5:03 PM)

 ** _Junnie:_** _did an annoying kid come in?_  
(5:05 PM)

 **_Wonu:_ ** _yes fuck children actually  
_ (read 2//5:05 PM)

 **_Gyu:_ ** _woah there hyung didn’t know u were into that stuff  
_ (5:06 PM)

 ** _Wonu:_** _I don’t need this_  
(read 2//5:06)

 _What did u want?  
_ (read 2//5:06)

 **_Junnie:_ ** _did u place an order for the flowers  
_ (5:07)

 _Gyu made two cakes cause he failed his mission  
_ (5:07)

 _the decorations came in yesterday cause #freeexpressshipping courtesy of soonyoung’s credit card  
_ (5:07)

 **_Gyu:_ ** _did he even agree to let you use it  
_ (5:09)

 **_Junnie:_ ** _…  
_ (5:09)

 _consent may or may not have been attained before use  
_ (5:09)

 _Jihoon can testify for me if u take me to court tho  
_ (5:09)

 **_Wonu:_ ** _that definitely means u got Jihoon to steal soonyoung’s personal info  
_ (read 2//5:10)

 _and yeah the flowers are in  
_ (read 2//5:10)

 _I just have to pick ‘em up before I get home  
_ (read 2//5:11)

 **_Junnie:_ ** _k cool hurry up and get home then  
_ (5:15)

 _we still gotta set up  
_ (5:15)

 **_Gyu:_ ** _I hope hao comes home in time  
_ (5:18)

 **_Junnie:_ ** _he better  
_ (5:20)

 _I’ve spent too much time  
_ (5:20)

 _shed too many tears  
_ (5:20)

 _sacrificed too many virgins  
_ (5:20)

 _to let this go to waste  
_ (5:21)

 **_Wonu:_ ** _what the actual fuck Junhui  
_ (read 2//5:23)

 _I’m cancelling u  
_ (read 2//5:23)

 _Im leaving my office now see u guys in a bit  
_ (read 2//5:30)

 **_Junnie:_ ** _wait no  
_ (5:34)

 _Wonu my love  
_ (5:34)

 _don’t do this to me  
_ (5:34)

 **_Gyu:_ ** _lol  
_ (5:37)

 

 

“That’ll be 20 000 won, will you be paying with card or cash?” the cashier asks, shooting Wonwoo a light-hearted smile as he drums his fingers on the counter. Wonwoo pulls out his wallet, mumbling a quick “cash” at the worker before fumbling with his bills. Finally managing to give his money to the employee, the other male processes the transaction before giving Wonwoo the bouquet laying on the table. Wrapping his hands around it and holding it stiffly yet carefully, Wonwoo bows to thank the worker before leaving the store.

It was around 6 PM, meaning Minghao’s last class of the day would have finished, but from what Wonwoo knew, the Chinese male would usually hang around campus for a bit, talking to some of his other friends, before stealing over to the campus bakery and begging one of the student workers there for scraps or leftovers. It was kind of funny, in Wonwoo’s opinion, how Minghao always described Mingyu as a dog yet he himself showcased very dog-like actions as well. The two same aged kids were alike in more ways than one, which is probably why they bickered so much. In any case, Minghao had been swinging by the bakery ever since he started university. If Wonwoo remembered correctly, it had something to do with Minghao not quite knowing how to order correctly in Korean so he had just kind of stood there until the bakery students eventually gave him leftover pastries from yesterday for free.

It was cute honestly, and sometimes, if Minghao couldn’t finish them all, the boy would bring them home for his housemates. A nice gesture, and even when Mingyu and Junhui scoffed them all down before Wonwoo could even see what was available, Minghao always made sure to keep a couple pastries hidden for Wonwoo. The corners of his mouth quirking up at the thought of Minghao making sure he got a fair share of sweets, Wonwoo hums happily as he makes his way home. Once he gets there however, he’s met with… an interesting scene to say at least.

Junhui was, Wonwoo wasn’t even sure, flailing on the ground with what seemed to be a _balloon_ pulled over his head. He could breathe, luckily, seeing as the object was only covering the top of his head – making him look bald and Wonwoo would be lying if he said he hadn’t taken almost a million pictures discreetly – but Wonwoo couldn’t figure out for the life of him how or _why_ that had gotten there. Mingyu was no help, having laughed his ass off the minute Wonwoo walked in, and was now currently panicking over the fact that they only had strawberry icing and that _that_ didn’t go with the aesthetic he was using – whatever that meant.

“You guys literally had _one_ job,” Wonwoo sighs, moving over to finally help Junhui rid himself of the balloon. It falls to the ground, dejected and stretched to no tomorrow, and Junhui races to the washroom to see what kind of damage his hair had undergone. Shaking his head, Wonwoo looks up to see Mingyu rejoicing, having found vanilla frosting, before grabbing the package of balloons and blowing them all up himself.

Scattering them around the room in a lame attempt at decorating, Wonwoo flops back onto the couch and surveys the hazardous party decorations set up by Junhui. Random streamers and plastic pom-poms were attached to the walls at random intervals with tape, there were a couple balloons stuck to the ceiling using static (because Wonwoo knew that none of them had money to spend on helium), and there was a large piece of paper on the coffee table, with coloured markers scattered next to it – a clear indication that Junhui had probably tried to make a poster only to give up halfway.

“Are we even going to finish by the time he gets home?” Wonwoo wonders out loud, looking over at the clock on the wall. “It’s 7:30, he’ll be home anytime now.”

“We _are_ done,” Junhui declares proudly, gesturing around the room in a grand spin. “Isn’t it wonderful? I call it, uhm, well I haven’t thought of a name for the whole art piece yet but it’ll come with time. You can’t rush genius you know.”

“The cakes are finished and iced,” Mingyu pipes up from the kitchen. Sure enough, as Wonwoo glances over, he sees two finished cakes side by side, chocolate and vanilla respectively, just before Mingyu puts a cover over them. “Although I kind of messed up and wrote ‘Mingyu’ instead of ‘Minghao’ at first – but hey! It’s not my fault our names are similar! It was a habit!”

“If Minghao runs away screaming from us after this I wouldn’t be surprised,” Wonwoo sighs, leaning back onto the couch. The whole scene was weirdly organized, horrendously put together, but comfortable. If there’s one thing no one in this house did, it was try too hard, and the decorations and cake preparations were a perfect example of that. It wasn’t like it was half-hearted, in fact, one could say they really did put their whole emotion into it. After all, who ever said feelings were organized and clean? What Wonwoo truly liked about the atmosphere of their home was not that everything was labelled and distinct, it’s more like things melded together. They spent so much time together that they had begun to adopt each other’s habits and now you couldn’t tell where Junhui, Wonwoo, Mingyu, or Minghao started or ended.

The sudden creaking of the door opening causes Wonwoo to jolt up. Junhui gasps loudly and manages to fall off the couch, while Mingyu full on screams – so much for being discreet. Whipping his head around, Wonwoo watches – with internal amusement but external horror – as Minghao surveys the messy room with a tired expression. The boy is clearly very much done with life, and from the way he’s loosely clutching the bag in his right hand, it’s obvious Minghao was about to drop dead from exhaustion. And he does drop, not his body but the bag in his right hand as he doubles over laughing.

“That’s my jacket,” Junhui states, scrambling into a more dignified position after his graceful fall from the couch. Wonwoo rolls his eyes, as Junhui points an accusing finger at Minghao’s shaking form, before Minghao takes a deep breath and straightens back out.

“I didn’t realize,” Minghao replies dryly. “Given the fact that it’s like, two sizes too big for me I really thought it was mine.”

“This isn’t how things were supposed to go,” Wonwoo whines gently as Minghao takes the jacket off and flings it into Junhui’s face. “Junhui you were the one who made the script and you didn’t even stick to it.”

“There was a script?” Mingyu asks, highly confused.

“Did you not check the group chat,” Junhui inquires, pouting gently as Minghao walks over to the kitchen counter. He leans heavily on it, still very much tired from his stressful week, until Mingyu leans over to lift the slender boy onto the counter. “You banshee.”

“I did check it and it wasn’t there!” Mingyu scoffs, indignant. “And why am I a banshee?”

“Did you not hear yourself when Minghao came home,” Wonwoo deadpans, ignoring the confused look on Mingyu’s face. “Wait, do you even know what a banshee is?”

“Irrelevant!” Junhui declares before Mingyu can reply. Minghao laughs at the dejected look on Mingyu’s face before leaning over and pressing a soft yet amused peck on the taller boy’s cheek. “We had a script but obviously, that’s gone to waste, but the show must go on!”

“What show?” Minghao asks finally, looking around the room once again. “Why is everything decorated anyways?”

“D-do you really not know?” Junhui blinks, looking between Minghao and the clearly ornamented room. Minghao shakes his head.

“Are you serious?” Wonwoo’s mouth drops as Minghao, once again, shakes his head.

“No way,” Mingyu breathes as Minghao stares back at the three of them, confused and perplexed. “You’re never this slow, not even when your half dead from exams. Are you good? Everything still in there?” Mingyu leans forwards, tapping Minghao’s head lightly. “Nah, I don’t think it’s hollow.”

“Stop that,” Minghao hisses, moving his head away and swiping at Mingyu’s hand like a cat. “I really don’t know okay? So, what’s up? Why are there flowers on the table?”

“Minghao,” Junhui says slowly. “What day is it today?”

“November 7,” Minghao replies easily. “It marks the end to my stressful as fuck week.”

“And? What else?” Wonwoo prompts.

“Uhm,” Minghao blinks. “Remembrance Day is coming soon?”

“Hao what day were you born?” Mingyu finally exclaims, tired of the endless questions and the seemingly oblivious Minghao. His cakes were getting cold –no one likes a cold cake – and Minghao looked like he was going to fall asleep on them at any given moment, he was not going to wait until Minghao’s sleep and nutrient deprived brain finally caught on.

“November,” Minghao says slowly. “7…”

“…”

“Oh fuck!” Minghao jolts up, mouth opening and closing as his eyes widen. He looks around the room one more time, finally taking in the fact that balloons and streamers and flowers equates to a birthday party of sorts before he laughs awkwardly. “I uhm, might have forgotten?”

“What?!” three voices exclaim together, staring at the man of the hour in a mixture of enjoyment, shock, and disbelief.

“You what?” Wonwoo says, calmer this time, just to make sure he had heard Minghao correctly.

“I forgot,” Minghao mutters sheepishly, ears flushing as he touches the back of his neck awkwardly. “About my birthday.”

“This is amazing,” Mingyu finally declares. He bursts out laughing, causing Junhui, Wonwoo, and eventually Minghao to follow. The mood in the room visibly lightens with Minghao smiling – albeit in a flustered manner – as his three housemates continue teasing him. “Anyways, since you never answered my question this morning about whether you liked chocolate or vanilla more, I made two cakes,” Mingyu announces, finally unveiling his creations. The smell of freshly baked cakes causes Wonwoo and Junhui to get off the couch and float towards the kitchen, Junhui grabbing a couple plates and forks along the way.

“Why does it look like it says ‘Mingyu’ but you crossed it off?” Minghao inquires as Mingyu begins to cut the vanilla cake.

“Irrelevant,” Mingyu dismisses before distributing the cake. They dig in to it unceremoniously – none of them were ever big on speeches and cheesy words. Just the fact that they were all there, happily sharing a moment together, was enough for them. And maybe, just maybe, that was even cheesier than words could be.

“Did you forget how to spell my name?” Minghao asks amusedly.

“Maybe but you forgot your own birthday so who’s the real winner here,” Mingyu retorts, sticking his tongue out at Minghao. The other boy groans, already imagining the distant future in which he would never be able to live this down, before moving his attention onto something else. “Those are nice flowers.”

“Hydrangea and geraniums,” Wonwoo supplies. “At least, that’s what the store person told me. We didn’t know what to get you since you were never much of a material person so we decided some flowers might be nice.”

“They are nice,” Minghao says, “thank you.” He pauses, looking around the room at the messy yet heart-felt décor of the room, before turning back to see the smiling faces around him. Mingyu had gone back to the cake, cutting himself – and Minghao – a second slice, while Junhui and Wonwoo started wondering about whose birthday was next. Grinning when he feels Wonwoo absentmindedly lean into Minghao’s side, the Chinese boy observes Junhui linking feet with Wonwoo while Mingyu yawns and places his head on Junhui’s shoulder. Like that, they were all connected. Their own little individual beings, yet together all the same.

“How are we going to eat all this fucking cake,” Wonwoo groans as he looks up to see more than half of both cakes still on the table. “I’m going to get diabetes before we finish even _one_.”

“Don’t be so dramatic,” Junhui rolls his eyes. “I haven’t even started,” the older, Chinese male grabs his fork again and leans over to cut another piece of cake with an exaggerated gusto.

“Please, you’re going to be sick,” Minghao wrinkles his nose as Junhui (and Mingyu) dig into more cake. “Or I’m going to be sick watching you eat so many sweets. Just pack it up and we can share it with Jihoon hyung and the others later. For now, I want to sleep.” Minghao yawns, eyes drooping with sleep now that the initial excitement of forgetting his birthday had worn off.

“Sounds like a plan,” Mingyu agrees before packing the cake – and his and Junhui’s unfinished slices – into the fridge. “Let’s go.” Laughing as Wonwoo pulls on Minghao’s hand, the four boys find themselves settled awkwardly on someone’s bed – from the way it smells and how messy it was, Minghao was pretty sure it was Wonwoo’s. Mingyu’s legs were on the ground, Junhui’s left arm was awkwardly nestled between his and Minghao’s chest, and Wonwoo’s entire right half was hanging off the bed. Even then, however, none of them moved as their giggles turned into snores and Minghao’s birthday eventually passed. It wasn’t the best and grandest birthday he’d ever had (in fact, with all the stress he had to endure, it was probably one of the worst) but he enjoyed it nonetheless – thanks to a certain rag tag group of man children he had the luck to call his own.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I was supposed to post this on Minghao's (aka my one and only, the light of my life and world, the most precious human being to have ever existed - this is coming from a completely unbiased view it's not like Xiao Hao Hao is my bias or anything psh-) birthday but I kind of forgot about it (whoops?) and I had a philosophy essay to prepare for so this is what happened.
> 
> Enough excuses can I even call myself a Minghao stan-
> 
> But yeah this chapter was inspired by the hellish week I had suffered last week (fairly similar to Minghao's) as well as my own thoughts on how I don't know how to comfort people who are feeling stressed and how, sometimes, when I'm stressed I feel like I'm the only one whose overwhelmed (wow look at that I'm channeling my own thoughts onto Minghao again, what a surprise).
> 
> Also don't quote me on the TA stuff I'm a smol bean whose just now choosing her university applications ;A;
> 
> Alrighty this note is getting oddly long now does anyone even read these-
> 
>   
> Hope you're smiling!  
> 
> 
>   
> ~ alateni  
> 


	7. good morning (afternoon?)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Morning people were lying to themselves; Wonwoo was sure of this.

_Click._

_Whirr._

_BOOM!_

 

Scrunching his eyes, Wonwoo feels his consciousness slowly rise from the depths of sleep. Groaning internally, Wonwoo snuggles closer into himself. Turning to his side, he hears the sound again, louder this time, before reaching out for his phone. Fingers scrambling against the bed, Wonwoo attempts to find the device and check the time but his hand encounters another slumbering form instead. Eyes opening immediately, Wonwoo looks up cautiously before sighing in relief when he spies a lightly snoring Minghao in front of him.

Yawning, Wonwoo sits up, and looks around the room in confusion. His phone was no where to be found, but by the sunlight streaming through the window it was easy to tell that it was a little past noontime. There were various pillows and blankets strewn on the ground however, and Junhui’s bed was empty. Interesting. Junhui and Mingyu were often the last to wake up, with Minghao getting up first and Wonwoo slightly afterwards. Now however, it seemed like things were in reverse. Minghao was still slumbering away and Junhui’s bed was already made – meaning Mingyu probably cleaned it up because God knows Junhui would never clean after himself.

Debating whether or not to get up or not, Wonwoo’s thoughts are interrupted by the door opening and two people sticking their heads in. Regarding Junhui and Mingyu’s curious eyes with blatant disinterest, Wonwoo decides that he’s worked hard enough this semester to skip the last of his afternoon classes (who knows why his alarm didn’t ring beforehand) and throws the blankets over himself once again. Ignoring the cries of alarm from the door, Wonwoo wraps one arm around Minghao and pulls the younger male towards him before sticking his nose into Minghao’s neck and smiling at the other’s comforting smell.

“This is an outrage!” Junhui whines, coming up to the right side of the bed, directly behind Wonwoo. Ignoring his verbal pouting, Wonwoo closes his eyes and listens as Mingyu approaches the other side of the bed.

“If you guys jump on me I swear to God no one is having children because they won’t have a dick anymore,” Minghao mumbles just as Mingyu shifts his weight onto the corner of the bed. Freezing at the threat, Wonwoo bursts out laughing as Mingyu gives him a helpless look. Shrugging in response, Wonwoo merely drags Minghao closer to him – if that was even physically possible – and blows teasingly into the younger’s ear. “Jeon Wonwoo that includes you too don’t think I won’t kick you off this bed.”

“This is my bed though,” Wonwoo huffs as Junhui laughs gently behind him, “you’re not allowed to do that.”

“I’m allowed to do whatever the fuck I want,” Minghao rolls onto his stomach, thrusting out a hand to stop Mingyu from climbing onto the bed. His hand hits Mingyu straight in the abdominal area, causing the taller boy to yelp and whine as Minghao keeps his hand pressed against Mingyu’s belly.

“We spoil you too much Hao,” Junhui shrugs, sitting next to Wonwoo – who had sat up and pulled his knees close to his chest – on the bed.

“Why does Junhui get to sit on the bed?” Mingyu whines. Wonwoo raises an eyebrow at Mingyu’s feeble attempts at getting past Minghao’s one arm. Of course, Mingyu wasn’t a weakling. He could easily bypass Minghao’s defenses – especially since the skinner boy was tired and sleepy (Minghao was always cuter and more compliant when he was groggy) – but, like Junhui said, they all spoiled Minghao just a little bit. Maybe it was because Minghao was the youngest and newest addition to the group, or perhaps it’s just because everyone found him adorable (in the manliest way possible) and endearing. Whatever it was, Wonwoo found it interesting how they all mutually agreed to give him as much attention as possible.

“Are you scared of him Gyu?” Junhui teases, leaning over to also throw an arm around Minghao. Minghao grumbles, lightly shrugging it off, but doesn’t move after Junhui grabs his hand. “You could beat him up pretty well if you tried, I mean, look at how tall you are, and Hao’s literally the skinniest thing alive so…”

“Wonwoo is skinny too,” Minghao mumbles over a mouthful of pillow. A slender limb flails out, probably in an attempt to kick Junhui, but it ends up slamming into Wonwoo’s shin instead.

“Fuck,” Wonwoo closes his eyes in pain, crouching over and rubbing the sore spot sadly. Minghao opens his eyes wider, a little apologetic, and shyly presses a tender kiss on Wonwoo’s lips before huddling back into the blankets. “God damn it Hao you can’t just hurt me and then pretend to be sorry like this afterwards,” Wonwoo whines lowly, reaching blindly for Minghao’s slender frame again. “This is an abusive relationship,” Wonwoo jokes before managing to flip Minghao over and initiating a proper kiss.

“This is still unfair!” Mingyu all but cries, eyes welling up with what appears to be tears, as his lower lip quivers. Junhui regards Mingyu in his full puppy mode before pitying the younger man and forcefully pulling the already entwined Minghao and Wonwoo closer to himself. Brightening up considerably at the extra room, Mingyu all put jumps into the bed, immediately grabbing onto Minghao and punishing him with kisses.

“I have morning breath,” Minghao complains as Mingyu squishes his cheeks together. “And you’re heavy get off my leg.”

“You smell fine Hao,” Wonwoo mutters as his face is still mushed against Minghao’s soft locks.

“What do I smell like?” Minghao asks, half interestedly and half jokingly.

“Like mint,” Mingyu responds. “But not like the toothpaste kind, the actual plant one.”

“I think he smells like something warm,” Junhui supplies, “baked bread maybe? The freshly made kind.”

“Probably because he waits outside the bakery like a lost puppy every week,” Wonwoo chuckles, causing Minghao to pout at their teasing. “But I think you smell like something fresh, kind of like Junhui’s but more nature-ish?”

“So like mine!” Mingyu cheers victoriously.

“Technically it’s a mixture of both,” Minghao points out. “I don’t do gardening though.”

“Our apartment isn’t big enough for a garden anyways,” Junhui comments. “Other than that one plant Wonwoo tried to grow before, there’s barely anything growing other than us four. And Mingyu needs to stop.”

“Stop what?” Mingyu asks, clearly offended. “Why is everyone targeting me today?”

“Stop growing,” Junhui replies. “You’re already taller than me and that’s offensive. I need to be the dominant one in this relationship and how am I supposed to do that if you’re taller than me?”

“Is this going to be like ‘whose dick is bigger’ or whatever?” Minghao snorts. “Because for sure neither of you have big–”

“My plant died because none of you fuckers watered it while I was visiting my family,” Wonwoo cuts Minghao off, eyebrows furrowing together at the memory. “I remember clearly telling you to water it at least once every two days and I come back to see it wilted and destroyed – like my dreams after moving in with you assholes.”

“I don’t remember you telling me to water it,” Mingyu blinks.

“He didn’t tell you because you’d probably forget,” Junhui replies. “I mean, sure you fix a bomb grilled cheese and can fix light bulbs for some reason but I wouldn’t trust you to take care of a living creature.”

“He told me but I just didn’t care enough,” Minghao smirks as Wonwoo pushes him away in somewhat of a vain attempt at revenge. “I think Junhui watered it like, once or something and then he forgot. No wait,” Minghao pauses momentarily, thinking back. “I remember now. Junhui was petty or something because apparently you took his bomber jacket with you when you left so he purposely didn’t water it.”

“Wow man, that’s not cool,” Mingyu scolds, shaking his head in disbelief despite the fact that all four of them were currently staring up at the ceiling and pushing the fact that they had responsibilities and duties to the back of their heads.

“Listen,” Junhui attempts to defend himself as Wonwoo turns on his side to glare quite menacingly at the other male. “That was my favourite jacket okay. And you just _took_ it. Without _asking_. I mean, how rude is that? Where are your manners Jeon Wonwoo? And you kiss your mother with that mouth?”

“To be fair he kisses all of us with that mouth,” Minghao states, rolling over as well to watch the exchange between the two same aged friends amusedly.

“And you’re only supposed to use that phrase when someone swears or says something bad,” Mingyu adds on, causing Minghao to nod in agreement. They somehow exchange a handshake, even though Minghao was facing the opposite direction and had to do so blindly, before Mingyu sits up slightly to turn the pillow he was sleeping on to the other, colder side.

“I don’t like it when you guys work together because you just turn into this really good, mean machine,” Junhui frowns.

“Would you rather us argue?” Minghao drawls lazily. When he gets no response, Minghao throws Junhui a triumphant smirk before yawning. “Anyways, what the hell was that noise from before? It woke me up and I don’t appreciate being awoken before noon on my one day off.”

“It’s actually like, almost 2 now,” Mingyu says, craning his head to get a glimpse at the digital clock beside Junhui’s bed.

“Okay but did anyone ask you,” Minghao replies.

“No but I decided to be helpful and actually useful – unlike you.”

“Says the giant baby who can’t open child-safe containers.”

“That was _one_ time and you couldn’t open it either okay, we had to get Junhui to open it.”

“Looks like their truce didn’t last very long,” Wonwoo smiles in amusement as Minghao practically turns around to pounce onto Mingyu. They end up scrambling around the bed a bit, miraculously managing to not hit, or knock Junhui or Wonwoo off of the bed in the process, before Minghao ends up laying directly on top of Mingyu with his arms restrained by Mingyu’s arms – which encircled Minghao’s entire girth in a happy hug. “But yeah, what the fuck was that noise?”

“Right,” Junhui grins at the memory, before exchanging a look with Mingyu. The taller boy sends Junhui a pleading stare, complete with his lower lip jutting out, before Junhui flips him off. “Yeah so Mingyu thought it would be a great idea to put aluminum foil in the microwave so it exploded and now we need a new one.”

“Why the fuck would you put _aluminum foil_ in the _microwave_ ,” Minghao all but screeches. He breaks free of Mingyu’s grip and immediately smacks the giant in the chest menacingly. “That is actually the stupidest thing I’ve heard this week. I think I’m losing brain cells just _thinking_ about it. Aren’t you a chef? Don’t they teach you safety regulations? Oh wait, they probably didn’t cover this because it’s so _idiotic_ and lacking in common sense that they never thought anyone working towards getting a licence that basically says they can stay in the kitchen would even think, no _dream_ , of doing something so _moronic_.”

“Minghao gets really fluent when he’s scolding someone,” Wonwoo observes as Mingyu tries to defend himself – both physically and verbally – from Minghao’s attack. “Or when he’s teasing Mingyu. Maybe he’s just fluent around Mingyu in general seeing as they’re always fighting.”

“Well that’s good isn’t it?” Junhui asks, snuggling closer to Wonwoo and moving backwards after wrapping a hand around the other boy’s waist. He carefully pulls them to the safety of the corner of the bed as the two younger males continue their fight. “I didn’t realize this bed was so large.”

“Same,” Wonwoo replies. “Who would’ve thought a cheap, garage sale purchase would be able to hold four, flailing men at the same time?”

“Well, you know what they say,” Junhui shrugs. “One man’s gold is another man’s silver.”

“Junhui I don’t think that’s how the saying goes,” Wonwoo blinks for a while, trying to understand what Junhui was attempting to say. “Do you mean one’s man’s trash is another man’s treasure?”

“Eh, same difference,” Junhui comments, nuzzling Wonwoo’s hair.

“Not really though? How can gold be silver? And why does that matter if technically they’re both valuable metals? You completely butchered the meaning,” Wonwoo points out. “Maybe you should get into more arguments like Hao, then perhaps your Korean would improve.”

“Shut up you literature nerd,” Junhui retorts, and Wonwoo resists the urge to punch Junhui’s handsome face in. Sighing, he decides that, well, someone has to be the bigger man here and swallows the insult he was about to throw out. Looking over to see whether Mingyu and Minghao had stopped arguing, he’s met with the peaceful sight of the two younger boys slumbering together, with Minghao on top of Mingyu’s chest.

“How the hell did they fall asleep so fast?” Wonwoo deadpans. “I didn’t even hear them stop arguing?”

“That’s because you were busy making love to the similes and metaphors you love so much,” Junhui replies. “Or I guess you could say you were professing your love for them.”

“You know what?” Wonwoo sighs, clenching his fist. “I didn’t sign up for this shit,” reeling back, Wonwoo sends a fast yet well-aimed punch at Junhui’s sternum and causes the other boy to fly off the bed. Crashing onto the ground, Junhui looks up at the smirking Wonwoo before the Korean turns back around and checks to see if Mingyu and Minghao had woken up.

“Wonwoo!” Junhui exclaims in disbelief from his spot on the floor.

“Sleeping,” Wonwoo replies. “And so are Minghao and Mingyu, so since you ratted Mingyu out about the microwave, you’re going to go out _right now_ and buy us a new one. We don’t sleep with snakes Junhui.”

“This is so unfair,” Junhui whines, before Wonwoo extends a leg from out of the blankets and kicks him in the direction of the door.

“Karma’s a bitch isn’t it,” Wonwoo retorts before practically melting into the warmth around him. Sighing, Junhui resigns himself to his fate and steps out of the room. Looking at the sad excuse for their microwave in the corner – it was still smoking for some reason – Junhui gets an idea before running towards the living room and grabbing his phone. Firing off a quick text message, Junhui places the phone back down and practically skips back to the bedroom and slips in beside Wonwoo.

“Why are you still here?” Wonwoo asks, eyes already drooping with drowsiness.

“The problem has been taken care of captain,” Junhui replies. “We’ll be getting a new microwave within the next three days if Jihoon chooses express shipping.”

“Jihoon? What does he have anything to do with this?” Wonwoo inquires, his half-asleep mind not managing to process the implications of Junhui’s words.

“It’s okay Won, you’ll find out later. Let’s just sleep for now,” Junhui answers and Wonwoo shrugs, too lazy to figure things out.

 

** MESSAGE TO: JiBoo (you whore) **

_you still have soonyoung’s credit card info right  
_ (2:12 PM)

 _wanna buy us a new microwave_  
(2:12 PM)

 _long story short mingyu’s an idiot_  
(2:12 PM)

 _but yeah you still owe me for that other time so thanks in advance bby love u_  
(2:12 PM)

 _just kidding please don’t let wonu or gyu or hao see this_  
(2:13 PM)

 _they’ll kill me_  
(2:13 PM)

 _i’m too handsome to die_  
(2:13 PM)

 _why am I still texting I have a nap cuddle session to get back to_  
(2:13 PM)

** MESSAGE FROM: JiBoo (you whore) **

_what the actual fuck  
_ (4:55 PM)

 _but ye I can do that for u  
_ (4:55 PM)

 _not my money after all_  
(4:55 PM)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Tbh the summary doesn't match the chapter but I couldn't think of anything because this is basically 2 000 words of pure fluff and rambling whoops. Also the beginning was literally just inspired by Boom Boom because slay me with comeback actually??
> 
> I'm a night owl js-
> 
>   
> Hope you're smiling!  
> 
> 
>   
> ~ alateni  
> 


	8. alpha

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Seokmin and Minghao have a chat about absurd things. Wonwoo comes to pick him up. Sounds like a day at kindergarten but it's really, REALLY, not.

“Hey Hao,” Minghao looks up from his spot on the floor, raising an eyebrow as Seokmin leans back in his chair, arms hanging limply at his sides as his head rolls back precariously. The foreign male waits for the other boy to clear his throat, having not spoken for a good, maybe ten, fifteen minutes (which was probably a new record in all honesty), before Seokmin straightens up. “Who’s the alpha in your relationship?”

“What?” Minghao’s eyebrows furrow, confused at the unfamiliar word. He shifts a little, elbows hurting with slight rug burn since he was laying on his stomach, before he contemplates whether reaching for his phone to search the word up would be beneficial or not. Knowing Seokmin, the other boy would be beyond happy to help Minghao figure out what it meant, but also knowing Seokmin, a simple two second Google search would turn into a full thirty minute explanation complete with a diagram and a trip to the moon and back.

“You could’ve just asked me,” Seokmin whines when Minghao opens the dictionary app on his phone. “I’m here for you man!”

“I know,” Minghao says simply, refusing to elaborate. He shimmies forwards instead, shoving the phone into Seokmin’s hands and waiting patiently as the other male types the word into his phone. Knitting his eyebrows together as he clicks on the definition, Minghao finds that his confusion has not been cleared but instead, increased exponentially.

“The first letter of the Greek alphabet?” Minghao reads tentatively. “What do you mean by this?”

“Try the second definition,” Seokmin laughs a bit.

“A code word representing the letter A, used in radio communication,” Minghao frowns. “I don’t think that’s right either. How does that tie into a relationship?”

“See? This is why I should be the one to explain things to you!” Seokmin smiles triumphantly, only for said grin to drop from his face when he sees Minghao copy the word and paste it into Google.

“So it’s slang?” Minghao asks as the page loaded – Seokmin’s dorm Wi-Fi was much slower than the one Wonwoo bought back at their apartment. Though, because Wonwoo bought it, he was given full rights the router – meaning he kicked literally everyone off whenever he and Jihoon decided they wanted to play Overwatch.

“Alpha… male?” Minghao echoes, looking at the various links and pages that came up. “Why is this related to sexual endeavors?” Minghao scrolls down a bit more, only to have Seokmin lean over and smack the phone out of his hands. “What the fuck?”

“I’m not going to let you accidentally click a link that leads to a porn page,” Seokmin declares, not even a little bit sorry about almost breaking Minghao’s phone. “Because one, Wonwoo hyung will probably kill me, and two, the dorm supervisor will also kill me because they’ll see that on my search history.”

“Then why the hell did you let me search it up?” Minghao asks, picking his phone up and getting into an upright position. He brushes his phone screen off, thanking his past self for laying down on the carpet in Seokmin’s room rather than the hardwood, before turning the phone screen on to see if Seokmin had broken it.

“I wanted you to admit that you wouldn’t be able to find it so then you’d have to come to me for help,” Seokmin replied proudly. “But that didn’t work.”

“You’re an idiot,” Minghao sighs before narrowing his eyes. “Now are you going to explain this whole thing to me or not?”

“Okay, okay!” Seokmin says, pouting. “You always win in the end, don’t you?”

“That’s what Mingyu always says,” Minghao frowns.

“Maybe _you’re_ the alpha one in the relationship then,” Seokmin ponders, ignoring the confused glance Minghao sends him. “Anyways, alpha is kind of like the dominant one? Usually in a sexual, bedroom kind of way but also just in every day life. So like, the alpha is the one who controls the relationship, makes decisions, the ‘top’ I guess.”

“Isn’t that just abusive?” Minghao rubs his bare elbows – maybe wearing a t-shirt wasn’t a good idea. The weather was warming up but still, Minghao was a slender person so he got cold easily. “Or like, an unhealthy relationship since one person is controlling the other?”

“No, no, not in that way,” Seokmin waves his hands in front of his face. “It’s like, though it’s kind of stereotypical and probably really offensive – I don’t mean it in that way you know – but it’s like who’s the ‘man’ and ‘woman’ in the relationship.”

“Oh,” Minghao states simply. “And why are you asking this?”

“Well cause,” Seokmin shrugs. “Usually in a two person relationship there’s one defined alpha and the other is more submissive I want to say? But you’re not in a regular relationship! How do the dynamics work between the four of you?”

“Are you really one to judge?” Minghao raises an eyebrow, leaning back on his arms. “When’s the last time you had a committed relationship?”

“Okay hold up this was not ‘let’s attack Seokmin time’ alright?” Seokmin huffs, causing Minghao to laugh. “But still, I’m curious.”

“Why not ask Jisoo hyung then? Or Seungcheol hyung and Jeonghan hyung?” Minghao complains, wanting to get back to work. After all, that was the whole reason he came over to Seokmin’s dorm. The other, studying to be a pediatrician, was having some trouble in one of the basic nutrition courses he was forced to take, so Minghao oh-so-generously decided to help him (more like Seokmin begged and bought him lunch for a week so he gave in after Mingyu pointed out how mean he was being).

“Because I tried and Jisoo hyung just smiled like a cat and Jeonghan hyung started telling me what happens in the bedroom,” Seokmin shivers. “And I didn’t get to ask Seungcheol hyung but you know them, Jisoo hyung and Jeonghan hyung have him wrapped around their little finger. He might look like the alpha but he can barely control those two when we hang out – I don’t trust that he’s the dominant one in the relationship.”

“Nice to know you’re analyzing your friends’ relationships,” Minghao points out. “At least now if we ever have a problem I’ll know to come to you first.”

“Why are you like this to me?” Seokmin pouts, shaking from side to side like a little child. It causes Minghao to retch. “It was an innocent question!”

“Well considering searching said question up results in porn links, I don’t think it’s very innocent,” Minghao states. “But I’ll humour you. What’s the criteria?”

“Well like,” Seokmin brightens up when Minghao stops making fun of him. “I guess they have to be the dominant one? The most… manly…?”

“Being manly is overrated,” Minghao rolls his eyes. “I mean I don’t know how many girls and boys have come up to me on campus and told me how ‘manly’ Mingyu was. I can’t believe people still think that about him. Yeah maybe when he first arrived and he still had a shred of dignity but he literally tripped over nothing the other day and spilled his entire water bottle as he entered the lecture hall – late might I add so everyone was already there.”

“It’s his face,” Seokmin declares with an air of bitterness. “Makes everyone overlook his bad points.”

“Aw, don’t worry Seokminnie,” Minghao coos, “you’re handsome too.”

“Aww, thanks,” Seokmin replies, and the two take turns cooing and awing over each other before Minghao leans forwards to smack Seokmin in the thigh.

“Alright, so maybe being manly is not a good point,” Seokmin thinks. “How about being cool and chic? Like the alpha is usually dominant, right? So they wouldn’t play around.”

“No one in our group is cool,” Minghao states. “Except maybe me.”

“No,” Seokmin says immediately, and Minghao pouts, wrapping his arms around his knees protectively as Seokmin laughs at his disgruntled mumbling. “Alright, how about this. Honestly, I thought the alpha was Mingyu at first but after getting to know him better, he’s really not. So for now my hypothesis is that it’s Jun hyung.”

“Junhui?” Minghao tilts his head to the side. “Why?”

“Well he seems the most collected,” Seokmin shrugs. “As if he was in control of everyone. Plus, he’s always flinging himself over you guys, claiming his right over you, you know? Like a dog.”

“Is possessiveness a trait of an alpha?” Minghao asks suddenly.

“I guess,” Seokmin thinks. “Alpha wolves are usually really aggressive and protective. Like they’ll defend their land and mates and stuff.”

“Then it’s not Jun,” Minghao sighs. He turns his phone on and checks the latest message, jolting up a bit as he reads the words, before getting up. “I have to go, apparently Wonwoo was here ten minutes ago and is waiting for me to get back home.”

“Wait,” Seokmin calls as Minghao collects his things and moves towards the door. “You never told me who the alpha was then!”

“That’s for me to know,” Minghao winks, “and you to contemplate.”

Stepping outside as Seokmin’s wronged shouts follow him into the hallway, Minghao picks up his pace. Practically sprinting down the stairs, the boy arrives outside the dorm, in the lobby area, soon after. Panting slightly at his run, Minghao looks around before finding Wonwoo easily, seeing as he was one of the only people in the room. Walking towards him, Wonwoo looks up from the person he was talking to before giving Minghao an odd look.

“So, who are you here for?” the girl asks just as Minghao steps beside Wonwoo. “Oh? Minghao?”

“Oh, hey Xiening jie,” Minghao smiles. “I didn’t know you lived in this complex.”

“I don’t,” Xiening smiles. “I’m visiting Sejeong.”

“Ah,” Minghao nods. “I was just with Seokmin. This is Wonwoo, he’s one of the people I live with – I told you before, right?”

“Oh, so _that’s_ why,” Xiening smiles mischievously. “I’ll be going now, and leave you to that,” Xiening continues, directing the last part of her sentence towards Wonwoo before skipping off.

“What does she mean by that?” Minghao asks, turning slightly and jumping a bit when he sees Wonwoo looking at him darkly. “W-we can get going now,” Minghao swallows when Wonwoo’s eyes trace over his face and move towards his neck.

“How did you get in anyways?” Minghao tries again as they exit the dorm. Wonwoo’s TA hours had just finished – apparently, according to the text Minghao received – and so the two began walking through the campus towards home.

“Xiening ssi opened the door for me when she saw me waiting outside,” Wonwoo answers simply, deep voice tinted with an edge of disapproval.

“Ah,” Minghao replies, not knowing what else to say. They continue to walk side by side, making their way out of the campus grounds and Minghao tries to think of why Wonwoo was acting like this. He couldn’t have been mad – though Minghao _had_ taken a bit of time to get down to the lobby. In all fairness, however, the foreign male had no clue Wonwoo would be coming to pick him up. The only reason Wonwoo had known he was at Seokmin’s in the first place was probably because the other male posted a Snapchat of the two same aged friends studying. In the end, Minghao and Wonwoo continue their trek silently, with Wonwoo looking over with a calculated expression every so often.

Sighing as he fishes his key out of his pocket, Minghao tries to ignore how Wonwoo presses in closer – like had been doing the whole walk back. Minghao wasn’t sure if Wonwoo was just tired and had bad depth perception, but the entire time they were going home the older boy had been constantly connected to him. Wonwoo had been practically breathing on Minghao’s neck, arm ghosting over Minghao’s waist and their thighs rubbing together every so often. Ignoring the shivers that went down his spine, Minghao successfully unlocks the door and enters, noting the dark room mentally, before throwing his keys into the small bowl they had by the door.

“Where are Jun and Mingyu?” Minghao asks, though he knew where they were. Mingyu was testing out recipes in the kitchen again and Junhui had a doctor’s appointment. Nevertheless, Minghao was feeling unsettled with the silence. Though Minghao and Wonwoo were known to be more quiet than the others, they still had a sense of craziness to them. Things were never _this_ quiet and tense, even when they would spend their afternoons reading together. Or, rather, Wonwoo read and Minghao did whatever he needed to do.

“How do you know Xiening ssi?” Wonwoo asks instead of answering him. He walks around the counter, cornering Minghao. The older male steps closer, and Minghao leans back unconsciously. The action seems to dissatisfy Wonwoo however, as the taller male places his hands on either side of Minghao’s frame, successfully caging him in.

“H-huh?” Minghao stutters, flustered. He wasn’t usually shy, though a bit quiet and wary at first when you meet him. Nevertheless, Minghao was always known amongst his friends as being an eloquent speaker (in the manner that he would always somehow find a way to twist your words around into an insult). But though he wasn’t new to this kind of foreplay from Wonwoo (or any of the others really, they all had a thing with picking him up and caging him in – something about his size they said), he was still taken by surprise.

“Xiening ssi,” Wonwoo leans his torso closer, until their noses were practically touching. His eyes held something dark and slightly predatory in them, as if watching a play unfold despite already knowing the ending. “How,” Minghao gulps slightly as Wonwoo’s hands inch closer to his waist. “Do you know her?”

“Club,” Minghao chokes out. “She was visiting her friend, Sejeong noona, the same time I paid Seokmin a visit. You know, at that vocal thing he does on the side. I think Jisoo hyung is a part of it too–”

“You guys seem friendly,” Wonwoo cuts off, eyes narrowing.

“Y-yeah, she comes from China too,” Minghao licks his lip, not missing the way Wonwoo’s eyes dart down to note the action, though his expression remains calm and calculating – not in a comforting way however, more like the calm before the storm. “So we bonded over that I guess?”

“And what were you doing at Seokmin’s?” Wonwoo continues, not even a little bit finished with his questioning. Wincing as Wonwoo’s left hands finally finds its way to Minghao’s waist, the foreign boy slumps into Wonwoo’s touch as he feels the grip on his hipbone tighten.

“Studying,” Minghao’s voice comes out as a soft whisper. He drops his gaze from meeting Wonwoo’s stare to examining the broad expanse of Wonwoo’s chest and admiring the way the simple black sweater he was wearing accentuating his skinny yet toned frame.

“Just that?” Wonwoo confirms, and Minghao nods. “Why didn’t you tell anyone? Were you too busy ‘studying’ to send a simple message Minghao?”

“No,” Minghao resists the urge to whimper slightly at the use of his full name. He felt like he was in the wrong, though he certainly wasn’t, and that he should be asking for Wonwoo’s forgiveness. “I guess I forgot.”

“Forgot,” Wonwoo practically growls, the low timbre of his voice causing Minghao to shiver noticeably. Wonwoo wraps his right hand around Minghao’s midsection before pulling him fully into Wonwoo’s embrace. Softly kissing the crown of Minghao’s head, the Chinese boy barely hears – though he very much feels it – Wonwoo’s words, whispered softly against Minghao’s scalp.

“I’m sorry,” Minghao speaks up, though he isn’t sure what he should be sorry for.

“Do you know what you’re sorry for?” Wonwoo asks almost immediately, moving one of his hands away from Minghao’s waist to tilt the younger boy’s chin up to look at him. “I see you don’t,” Wonwoo says, almost triumphantly. “Do you want me to tell you why you should be sorry?” Minghao nods, not trusting his voice.

“Well,” Wonwoo continues, tapping Minghao’s nose. If it were anyone else, the slender boy would have felt a tad offended, the action was very condescending, but it was Wonwoo. Wonwoo who never meant bad with anything and just liked to sing a lot. So Minghao accepted it. Though he was sure, now that Wonwoo was in one of these moods, that if he brought it up he’d only be in more trouble. “Imagine if you were me. Coming home from a long day at work – dealing with stupid little first years who don’t know how to turn assignments in online,” Minghao giggles a little at this, “only to find out that one of _his_ lovers was with someone else.”

“I wasn’t!” Minghao denies immediately, only to be shushed with a sharp look from Wonwoo – causing Minghao to once again be reminded of how intimidating Wonwoo could be at times.

“You were in Seokmin’s room,” Wonwoo points out. “Alone, without telling anyone. And then you come down and act all friendly and comfortable around this girl I’ve never seen before. Don’t you think this calls for some alarm? I’d like to think we’re close enough that you’d tell me about your life and friends Minghao.”

“But,” Minghao starts out, only for his voice to feebly dissipate as Wonwoo gives him another look. “You don’t have to worry, I’m not going to fly away. It’s not like I’m good enough to be picked up by someone else–”

“Hey,” Wonwoo says curtly, tone serious. He leans in, capturing Minghao’s lips in a strong kiss that leaves Minghao breathless and slightly warmer than he was before. Automatically raising his hands up and instinctively running them through Wonwoo’s hair as their lips met in a kiss again, Minghao whines slightly as Wonwoo leans back, pulling at Wonwoo’s hair in dissatisfaction.

“Don’t say that,” Wonwoo says, voice taking on a lecturing tone.

“Yes sir,” Minghao jokes, causing Wonwoo to smile, his earlier mood dissipating. The two lean forwards to kiss again, and a series of slow and lazy kisses follow. Minghao isn’t sure how long they stand there, with his back leaning against the counter and Wonwoo’s arms wrapped around his, but soon enough, his legs are aching and his lips are swollen. They keep going however, though Minghao isn’t the one to start anything. Wonwoo leans forwards, again and again to kiss, bite, and lick at Minghao’s lips. And every time the younger boy pulls back to breathe, he’s met with the dark, almost possessive look on Wonwoo’s face.

“What a scene to come home to,” Junhui’s voice causes the two to break apart. Minghao cranes around awkwardly, seeing as his back was turned towards the door and Wonwoo’s arms were still caged around his waist, to see Mingyu and Junhui enter the apartment. “And I wasn’t even invited.”

“Shut up,” Wonwoo says simply, voice husky. It causes Minghao to shiver, seeing as he directly underneath the other boy and could feel the vibrations moving through Wonwoo’s chest. Tearing himself away from Wonwoo’s grasp, Minghao turns around fully, eyes narrowing in on the fried chicken bag in Mingyu’s hands.

“You got dinner?” Minghao clears his throat embarrassingly as Junhui sends him a knowing look.

“Damn, how long were you guys at that?” Junhui smirks, exchanging a glance with Wonwoo before he retires to his room, no doubt to get changed and laze around until dinner was ready.

“Yeah, from the place you and Wonwoo went last time, WM or something? Though I think the name changed,” Mingyu says, totally unfazed as Wonwoo leans forward to bury his face into the crook of Minghao’s neck. “They joined up with the chicken place next door – I can’t believe you guys didn’t get me chicken from there – and so now they’re called Haepari WM. A really weird name but whatever, I guess it works to remember them by?”

“Or it’ll just be harder to remember,” Minghao points out. Mingyu shrugs, setting the chicken onto the table before going into their shared room to change. Just as Minghao raises his voice to yell at Mingyu for putting the greasy chicken on the glass table – who was going to clean that thing? Minghao that’s who – the angry shout Minghao had been preparing soon turned into a high-pitched yelp as Wonwoo bit his neck.

“W-Wonwoo!” Minghao says, in shock and slight pleasure when Wonwoo kisses the mark he had made on Minghao’s neck – right above his collarbone.

“Mmmm?” Wonwoo hums lazily, nosing Minghao’s neck.

“What was that for?” Minghao hand immediately comes up to press the tender spot. He was sure the area was turning red, and soon enough it would be a noticeable mark.

“A reminder,” Wonwoo whispers into Minghao’s ear, biting the lobe before backing away. Minghao twirls around, staring as Wonwoo smirks before following Junhui into their shared room. “That you’re mine and shouldn’t go around without telling me where you’re going.”

“Unbelievable,” Minghao sighs as he hears Mingyu tease him about his yelp from the other room. Shaking his head as he presses a finger against the mark Wonwoo had made on his neck, Minghao smiles. If an alpha was possessive, then it wasn’t Jun. After all, the most territorial one out of all of them was, without a doubt, Wonwoo.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Recently I've been getting more into Gugudan (hence Xiening aka Sally and Sejeong). I mean, I've already been into them since I love VIXX and Sejeong since PD101 but Wonderland was not cutting it for me. A Girl Like Me is quite good though.
> 
> Sorry about not updating, I had exams and then the new semester and things were busy and I was not in the writing mood. Hopefully this chapter will make up for it? I always imagined Wonwoo as the silently possessive type, so humour me and disregard how passive I made Minghao in this chapter- By the way, this is an insanely biased, self-indulgent fic so every chapter is probably going to be Minghao-centric. Whoops?
> 
> Also, guess who WM Pizza Parlour joined up with? WM is from WM Entertainment that houses Oh My Girl (my loves) and B1A4 and now they're joined with a chicken place because I love those idols too and want to include them. I'm sure it's really easy but yeah, a little bit of trivia for you all.
> 
>   
> Hope you're smiling!  
> 
> 
>   
> ~ alateni  
> 


	9. extremes

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> 'Cause you're hot and you're cold...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Inspired by Minghao's profile [thing.](http://starlighttaekwoon.tumblr.com/post/159311746850/seventeen-self-written-profile)
> 
> I highly recommend you click the link from which this was inspired from and read through all of it because everything written there is precious and amazing.
> 
> Happy Easter (if you celebrate it) and if not, well, have a great day (although the day is practically ending...)

“Wonwoo,” Mingyu calls frowning as he walks into Wonwoo and Junhui’s shared room. Wonwoo is laying on his bed, feet swinging in the air as he texts someone – much like a teenage girl in a movie. Junhui sits at his desk, scribbling away at his notebook. They both turn to look at him. “Where’s my blanket?”

“On your bed?” Junhui replies, stretching lazily. He holds his chin up with his hand, leaning heavily on the wooden desk in front of him, sleepiness evident in his posture and gaze. The window in between Junhui’s desk and bed had it’s curtains down, but that didn’t stop the warm sunlight from leaking into the room. Comparably, it was a welcome escape from the colder temperatures winter brought, but right now, it was _too_ warm.

Mingyu wasn’t sure if it was because of global warming or if it was just weird spring weather, but the temperatures lately had been reaching summer time levels. It was almost insane, with how hot and humid outside. The worst combination honestly, and was obvious – with the shorts and sleeveless shorts all the boys in the house were warming – that the others thought likewise.

“Not there,” Mingyu says. “Why would I be asking you if it was?”

“Who knows,” Wonwoo shrugs. “You’re weird like that. Why would I know where it is then?”

“Because we watched a movie in here the other day and we always build little blanket nests,” Mingyu explains.

“You watched a movie without me?” Junhui blinks.

“You were busy,” Mingyu states.

“You could have at least asked,” Junhui sniffs, a little hurt but mostly just petty. “I know where your blanket is by the way.”

“And you didn’t mention this before because?” Mingyu trails off, leaning against the wooden frame of the doorway. He welcomed the cool substance against his heated cheek, though it was beginning to warm up considerably.

“You asked Wonwoo, not me,” Junhui replies easily. He turns around fully, notebook forgotten, and drums his fingertips on the tabletop.

“But you’re the one who answered him anyways,” Wonwoo points out. Junhui gives him a betrayed look, to which Wonwoo stares back blankly. Mingyu snickers as Junhui whines about being bullied, and full on laughs when the older Chinese male gives him a pouty expression. Scowling at Mingyu’s teasing, Junhui schools his face into a more neutral look.

“Anyways, did you check the other side of your room?” Junhui asks, to which Mingyu stares at him in confusion and shakes his head slowly. “It’s hot right? And what’s cool?”

“The ground?” Wonwoo replies.

“Blankets, if they’re not slept in yet,” Mingyu answers.

“Exactly. And,” Junhui continues, “who in this apartment hates the heat?”

“Oh,” Mingyu says at the exact same time as Wonwoo. Leaving the room without thanking Junhui – to which the older boy mumbles profanities underneath his breath – Mingyu makes his way back to his shared room and quietly tip toes to Minghao’s side of the bed. True enough, laying as close to the air conditioning vent as possible in a nest of blankets (now that Mingyu thinks about it, Junhui and Wonwoo’s blankets had disappeared as well) was Minghao. The slender boy was half curled in them, alternating between fabrics.

Minghao appeared to have a system, seeing as he had four blankets and all (eight now that Mingyu looks closely, the winter ones they were using and the summer ones kept in the closet). He would engulf himself in one or two of them, all while laying next to the air conditioning vent, while the other blankets cooled down. Once the blanket he was using got too hot, Minghao would wiggle out of it, sometimes kicking it away and other times just rolling, and burrow into another, cooler one. He almost looked like a squirrel or something, Mingyu was never very good at biology, and it was absolutely _adorable_. Minghao probably thought otherwise though, the other boy looked as if the only thing on his head was getting away from the heat.

The thing was, Minghao didn’t like the cold either. During the winter time, he had barely spent any time sleeping in his own bed. Instead, he jumps from Junhui’s, to Wonwoo’s, to Mingyu’s bed – depending on who had to wake up the earliest (the boy was quite the grumpy little fellow when he was sleepy). It was one of Mingyu’s favourite parts of the winter to be honest, because usually Minghao doesn’t like to physically associate with him (as a joke, Mingyu keeps telling himself). During the colder months however, Minghao was practically a koala. He’d always be hugging someone or another, and it took all your effort to pry him off of you. Even at night, Minghao was as close to Mingyu as he could possibly be, taking Mingyu’s body warmth like a leech.

“Minghao,” Mingyu perches on top of Minghao’s bed, watching as Minghao rolls away from a sunflower patterned blanket (definitely not theirs, maybe Seokmin had left it or something the last time he slept over). “Can I have my blanket back?”

“No,” Minghao mumbles, voice muffled by the blanket underneath him. His face was planted directly into the soft fabric (Junhui’s blanket, Mingyu recognizes the faded pink design) and it didn’t look like he was going to move anytime soon. “You don’t even need it yet.”

“I’m doing the laundry,” Mingyu replies. “Now that it’s getting warmer we’re probably going to switch to the summer blankets, so now’s a good time to wash the winter ones.”

“Do it later,” Minghao replies. “I’m busy.”

“Your system will still work with four blankets – five actually since that one to your left is definitely Seokmin’s,” Mingyu points out, sneakily leaning down to try and grab at the blanket farthest from Minghao’s reach. He’s rewarded with a sharp slap on the wrist and a glare however, and Mingyu sighs, always forgetting how sharp witted Minghao was.

“No wonder it smells weird,” Minghao mumbles, poking at Seokmin’s blanket with his toe.

“So are you going to let me wash them now?” Mingyu tries hopefully.

“Nope,” Minghao replies, voice weighed down from, what Wonwoo liked to call, heat induced sleepiness. “It’s not going to work the same way if I only have four.”

“What do you mean _only_ ,” Mingyu sighs. He stands up and reaches down, forcibly pushing Minghao to the side as he rescues his and Wonwoo’s blanket before being pushed away. Flinging the salvaged fabrics to the other side of the room – out of Minghao’s reach, Mingyu easily resists Minghao’s efforts. The shorter boy was by no means weak – though his slender build made others think differently – but, because of his heat induced state, he was a lot softer then he usually was. Which was one of Mingyu’s favourite parts of summer.

The heat made Minghao sleepy, dazed, uncomfortably hot and very lazy. He grew extremely pliant and ever so soft, often too heated to do much more than bark back. And so Mingyu was allowed to do basically anything to him, whether that be teasing or skin ship, Minghao was just to tired to care or fight back. Actually, he did try to fight back, but he was easily pushed aside. It was, as Mingyu always said, his weakest state. Of course, come night time when the temperatures fixed themselves (Minghao’s words, not his), Mingyu was in for a beating. But for those long summer days, Mingyu was in charge.

“Minghao,” Mingyu says sharply, causing the other boy to look up with a disgruntled expression. “Here, let me take these blankets and then we’ll figure out another way to get rid of the heat.”

“Last time I agreed to that Junhui just held me hostage and cuddled me for the whole day,” Minghao frowns. “Apparently, he only did it because I wouldn’t fight back and he couldn’t resist.”

“It’s true,” Mingyu mutters.

“What?”

“Nothing, listen, I have an idea,” Mingyu says. He watches Minghao looks at him cautiously, distrust written all over his face. “I’ll tell Wonwoo to turn the AC on more and while it’s cooling the house down we can take a cold shower.”

“Why do you have to be in there too?” Minghao complains, but Mingyu can see him perk up at the idea. The younger boy sits up, frowning when Mingyu leans down to take the other blankets away from him, but lets him do so nonetheless.

“Because you’ll probably faint of heat exhaustion or die of hypothermia,” Mingyu replies. “Besides, you like showering with me.”

“I do not!” Minghao cries almost immediately, flushing a nice shade of red. Mingyu laughs at that, nodding along to appease the other male, before reaching over and grabbing his wrist. He pulls him over to the washroom, telling Wonwoo his plan along the way (the older boy practically cries when he realizes how much the electricity bill is going to be this month but agrees nonetheless, after all, while a dazed Minghao was cute, no one wanted him to be truly uncomfortable).

“Hmm,” Minghao hums a while later, when they’re both in the shower. He leans his face against Mingyu’s chest, closing his eyes in happiness as the cold water rains down on them. Mingyu giggles a little at the sight, and coos at him instead. Minghao ignores the noise, and sighs contently when Mingyu runs his hands through Minghao’s damp hair.

“Mingyu?” Minghao asks, causing Mingyu to let out a ‘hmm?’ in response. “Do you want to cuddle after this?”

“I thought you didn’t like cuddling in the summer,” Mingyu replies amusedly. “Too much body heat.”

“The AC will be on,” Minghao defends himself. “And if it’s you guys it’s okay.”

“I’m honoured,” Mingyu grins, and Minghao slaps his bicep in retaliation. “We’ll even take turns then, like your blankets.”

“Sounds like a plan,” Minghao mutters. “Now wash my back.”

 

They don’t end up taking turns. Wonwoo thinks it’s unfair and Junhui can never stop himself from manhandling _anyone_. In the end, Minghao suffers from the body weight _and_ heat of three other people, but hey, at least the AC was on.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am 100% guilty of doing what Minghao does. I actually got inspired by that because I was doing just that (rotating blankets) after I woke up from my nap today. That and I press myself up against the wall 'cause the coolness from outside permeates inwards.
> 
> Originally this was just going to be a GyuHao thing with Minghao rejected Mingyu's attempts at cuddling because he's too hot (I mean Minghao is too warm not like Mingyu is too sexy to be be cuddled-) and Mingyu gets all pouty before Minghao makes an exception but you know what's better than Gyuhao? WonHuiGyuHao.
> 
> Also, I've finally decided (though this was originally set in Korea) that I'm going to have it set in North America since one, I realize I already used the North American school system, and two, it's just easier for me to write since I know how this culture is like. SO NOW WE KNOW FOR FUTURE REFERENCE-
> 
>   
> Hope you're smiling!  
> 
> 
>   
> ~ alateni  
> 


	10. on my side

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Most of the time, Mingyu appreciates his roommates - loves them even. Other times, Mingyu could really live without all the sass that flies around. It's not good for his heart.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's been a long time my friends... Though I did say (I think?) this was more of a collection of oneshots surrounding the same universe than a coherent story (as you can probably tell since all the chapters are pure fluff and softness).
> 
> In any case, here's some more wonderful OT4 fluff for you all.

“Are you dieting?” Mingyu looks up from his phone, eyes widening as he meets Minghao’s curious ones. The slender male leans forwards, trying to peek at Mingyu’s screen again before the taller boy moves it away. Minghao pouts, watching as a half-guilty expression makes its way onto Mingyu’s face, before straightening up. “You don’t need to diet, you know that right?”

“I’m not dieting,” Mingyu replies. He stutters however, so Minghao merely narrows his eyes. “I’m positive,” he reiterates, trying to sound more forceful and confident this time. It doesn’t seem to sate Minghao, but the sharp-tongued male holds his words for now. “It’s an assignment, for class.” Mingyu finally turns his phone towards Minghao and lets the other boy read off of it. “I have to make a healthy menu for someone looking to lose weight.”

“I don’t know if I believe you,” Minghao says. “But I’ll drop it for now. Wait until I tell Junhui though.”

“Don’t,” Mingyu groans. Junhui, bless his heart, was always the concerned friend. From looking after them to making sure they were wearing enough clothes, he was, without a doubt, the replacement mother they never knew they needed until Junhui threatened to hold their phones captive if they didn’t put on another layer _right now_. If Junhui heard about Mingyu potentially dieting – which he _wasn’t_ , Minghao just liked to make his life hard – Mingyu would be watched over like a hawk for the next month.

“I’m kidding,” Minghao replies, hopping up to sit on the counter. Ignoring Mingyu’s complaints (the kitchen was _his_ space, no one gets to sit on the counters and dirty them) Minghao hands the taller boy his phone back. “So, what’s on the menu, chef?”

“You don’t like to eat healthy,” Mingyu responds, slipping his phone into his pocket.

“I’m the nutritionist,” Minghao reminds, “wouldn’t it be better for me to help you with this?”

“Oh,” Mingyu blinks. He had completely forgotten about that. It wasn’t like he didn’t care, he really did, but for some reason, he couldn’t get it through his head that Minghao studied nutrition. He remembered Wonwoo and Junhui’s majors easily enough, heck, he knew what his little cousin was planning on studying, and he saw her twice a year. Regardless, Mingyu throws that thought to the back of his head and vows to remember Minghao’s major more clearly this time (though he had done this the last time, and the time before that).

“Isn’t that cheating?” Mingyu finally asks.

Minghao snorts. “Does it say you can’t ask anyone in the rubric?” Mingyu shakes his head. “Then it’s fine. I’m not telling you what to do, I’ll just be advising you whether your menu will fulfill required dietary needs. Which reminds me, how many calories is this person in taking? Is this a purely diet based weight loss thing or are they exercising too?”

“Uh,” Mingyu blanks. Obviously, Minghao was much better at this then he was – which didn’t surprise him. When he had first received the assignment, a couple of the kids behind him had complained that this sounded more like a nutrition assignment than anything. They had then been totally schooled by the professor, who reminded them that if, as chefs, they made a menu that was unhealthy, no one would want to eat at their restaurant. As such, the project was necessary to ‘find a balance between taste and health’ – as the professor had so eloquently put it.

Minghao laughs at the confusion on Mingyu’s face. “You don’t know anything do you? Give me the phone again.” Handing the device over, Mingyu decides to leave Minghao to his own business. Walking over to the fridge, Mingyu pulls the door open. Simultaneously wondering what to cook for dinner and going over possibilities for his project, Mingyu notes that they were running out of almond milk. Personally, Mingyu hated almond milk with a passion. It tasted nothing like milk, and if he wanted a milk substitute, he’d much rather use soy milk if anything. Junhui however, had an odd affection for green tea lattes after working at Starbucks for half a semester. After which, Minghao forced Mingyu to learn a healthier – and cheaper – green tea latte recipe so Junhui wouldn’t end up in debt (the older Chinese male would definitely sell his soul for another green tea frappe, Minghao knew it, Wonwoo called it, and Mingyu, begrudgingly, accepted it).

“I think I got it,” Minghao calls after Mingyu finishes taking inventory of the fridge. “Your subject – makes it sound like you’re about to do surgery or something – is exercising but it’s more on the light side. A jog once or twice a week, which isn’t ideal honestly but I guess it’s better than nothing. They also gave you the specifics like age and sex – stuff like that to help you calculate metabolism and all that fun stuff.” Minghao pauses, looking up from the phone to gauge Mingyu’s reaction. “You don’t understand what I’m saying, do you?”

“No, but I’m very glad you’ve decided to help me because I never realized this was going to be this complicated,” Mingyu confesses, causing Minghao to giggle. Mingyu’s heart melts at the sound. He loved making people laugh, but whenever Wonwoo, Minghao, or Junhui did, Mingyu felt like he had transcended to heaven. There was no other way to describe that noise other than heavenly.

Minghao’s laugh was always an adorable one, even if it was at Mingyu’s expense. It suited his accent, making it bubblier than others. There was no way to describe it really, it didn’t flow elegantly, it was more poppy, kind of like a concentrated feel good song. Then again, Mingyu was never good with words. Wonwoo could spout lines and lines of poetry, Mingyu though? He went by describing things with weird noises and odd gestures. It worked, but Mingyu never got full marks on essay type questions because, well, noises don’t translate well on paper.

“I wonder if your classmates are going to think about this that way,” Minghao muses. “I mean, they could easily overlook this information as extra fluff they don’t need to pay attention to. Though I think I should dumb it down a bit or else it’ll be obvious to whoever’s marking this that you didn’t do it alone.”

“Are you calling me stupid?” Mingyu raises an eyebrow.

“Well I’m not calling you smart,” Minghao shrugs. “Then again, I also never said the word ‘stupid’ so it’s merely up to interpretation.”

“Touché,” Mingyu hums, used to the way Minghao teased and made fun of him. It was probably unhealthy to some extent, seeing as the other day someone tried to make him angry by calling him a “bumbling idiot” and all Mingyu had done was nod and agree. It confused the hell out of the offender, but Mingyu guesses he should thank Minghao for giving him such a tough skull. At least he wouldn’t be as easily affected by hate now – though, if he ever voiced these thoughts out loud, Minghao would scoff and tell him he wasn’t important enough to get hate.

“Do people even say that anymore?” Minghao raises an eyebrow. “Gosh you’re so irrelevant.”

“Minghao, stop being mean,” a deep voice rumbles from behind the two males in the kitchen. “And Mingyu, what are we eating tonight?” Wonwoo walks in through the doorway, stopping directly behind Minghao before wrapping his arms around the younger boy’s slender waist and resting his head on Minghao’s shoulder.

“I’m not being mean, I’m just telling the truth,” Minghao insists, before sinking into a compliant silence when Wonwoo nuzzles his nose into the other boy’s neck. Humming softly in acknowledgement, Wonwoo opens his eyes and looks at Mingyu.

“We’re missing eggs,” Mingyu says in lieu of a reply. “I was going to make Junhui buy some on his way home.”

“He’s going to forget,” Wonwoo and Minghao say at the same time. The two share a laugh, before Wonwoo presses closer to the younger boy and Minghao ends up pressed against the counter top.

“You two are very mean – especially when together,” Mingyu notes. They don’t seem to hear him, too busy exchanging Eskimo kisses. Rolling his eyes, Mingyu turns back to his beloved (the fridge) before scrounging around the rest of the kitchen. He had originally planned to make fried rice for dinner, something simple but filling, but seeing as there were no eggs available, he’d have to improvise. Sure, he could’ve texted Junhui like he had been planning to, but there was an air of truth in Wonwoo and Minghao’s words. Junhui, though caring and motherly, often forgot things. Important things. He would have forgotten about his final last semester had Wonwoo not reminded him a week early.

Shaking his head, Mingyu finds a smile on his lips as he thinks about Junhui’s antics. The older male was almost as bad as Mingyu in terms of accidents (in Mingyu’s case though, those mostly happened because he was clumsy). Regardless, Mingyu whirls around the kitchen, avoiding the snarky duo perched on the left side of his counter top. By the time Junhui came home, Mingyu had managed to throw together a reasonable dinner of leftover rice and tuna kimchi jjigae. Shooing Minghao and Wonwoo away to go set the table up, Mingyu smiles welcomingly as Junhui shrugs his bag off. The older male (along with Mingyu) had signed up for summer classes and were just as busy as they had been during the regular school session. While Minghao and Wonwoo slept until noon, Mingyu and Junhui were often rushing to and from classes and the library. Granted, summer school was easier than the regular term, but Mingyu still complained.

“You coming?” Junhui asks, and Mingyu looks up in surprise. The older male had changed into more comfortable clothes and was standing where Minghao and Wonwoo had been before. Speaking of which, Mingyu looks around, the two had come in and grabbed the food without Mingyu noticing. A feat, seeing as the kitchen was Mingyu’s land and nothing escaped his sight within it.

“I guess,” Mingyu rubs his eyes.

“You seem tired,” Junhui observes, slinging an arm over Mingyu’s shoulder and guiding him towards where Minghao and Wonwoo were already eating – the ungrateful savages.

Mingyu yawns, “I had to wake up early today. The professor said whoever helped taste test dishes for the diner this morning would get extra credit.”

“At least you got free food out of it,” Junhui supplies, to which Mingyu nods and shrugs. Junhui laughs at him, a tinkling kind of thing that lifts some of the stress of school away from Mingyu’s shoulders. Pulling Mingyu along, Junhui sits down across from Wonwoo and pushes Mingyu into the seat beside him. “Did you guys even leave some for us?”

“Of course we did,” Minghao snorts. He hands Mingyu and Junhui their bowls, before retreating from Junhui’s playful hands. “How was school you nerd?”

“I’m not a nerd because I took summer school,” Junhui sighs. “We’ve been over this.”

“Sure we have,” Wonwoo smirks. “Nerd.”

“I’m done,” Junhui shakes his head fondly. Taking his chopsticks, Junhui maneuvers some food into his bowl before scooping some soup up as well. “Tastes great, as always Gyu.”

“Thanks,” Mingyu flushes slightly at the compliment. He’d never get used to any of the three of them complimenting him. Sure, he knew his cooking was pretty good. It wasn’t the best in his class, but compared to your regular university student, it was miles ahead. Hell, some _mothers_ that tried his cooking even told him it was better than theirs. That was an achievement.

Still though, there was something different about the other three. Even if the president complimented his cooking, Mingyu doesn’t think it would hold the same weight as Minghao’s words. Or Junhui’s. Or Wonwoo’s. He had brought it up once with one of their older friends, and was told that it had to do something with how important they were to Mingyu. There was a difference, Mingyu thinks, between a stranger complimenting you and a close loved one. Sure, the stranger’s words hold within its own special feeling. It felt good, to have someone that didn’t know you at all earnestly praise your work. Insincerity was less of a concern in that case, seeing as the stranger didn’t know you and definitely didn’t have to worry about hurting your feelings (though, Mingyu reflects, some might argue otherwise).

Regardless, though it was nice to have someone compliment you with no strings attached, Mingyu always felt like that feeling was a short-lasting one. Rather than have a million of those, Mingyu would much rather have one, earnest compliment from someone he loved. He held them in high regard – they were the ones he cared for and so they were the ones he tried to never disappoint. In that way, Mingyu can see why a compliment from Junhui could trump any other praise he had received from others. Mingyu sought their approval, as needy and somewhat pathetic as that sounds. He loved them, too much sometimes, and so their words mattered most to him.

“The idiot is blushing again,” Minghao rolls his eyes. “Do you think he’d combust if we kept complimenting him?”

“Hush you,” Junhui scolds. Minghao merely sticks his tongue out before shovelling rice back into his mouth. Mingyu laughs at that, grateful that Junhui was back home. At least now he’d have someone on his side.

“Hey,” Wonwoo says as they finish up eating. They play rock-paper-scissors to decide who would wash the dishes, before Minghao gets fed up after Wonwoo and Junhui tie for the fifth time in a row and decides to wash the dishes by himself. Mingyu looks up at Wonwoo, a questioning look in his eyes. He nudges Junhui, causing the older boy to drop his phone, before he focuses on Wonwoo as well. “Do you want to switch rooms?”

“What?” Mingyu blinks.

“You don’t like me anymore?” Junhui pouts. Looking up, Mingyu sees Junhui’s lower lip tremble. Had it been anyone else, Mingyu would have barrelled on ahead to make fun of them, but Junhui was different. He was soft, sensitive almost. Between the four of them, Junhui – despite his outward appearance – was the one who got hurt the most. He acted fine on the outside, keeping up a cheery exterior in order to stop people from worrying about him, but, in fact, Junhui worried the most. He took things to heart a lot, something Minghao had told him time and time again to stop doing, and couldn’t help but make impersonal things personal. If Mingyu had to choose one person between the four of them to be protected by a magical barrier at all times, it would have to be Junhui (and he’s pretty sure Wonwoo and Minghao would agree).

“No,” Wonwoo sighs. “Not like that Junnie.”

“Okay,” Junhui replies softly. He looks down at his hands, and Mingyu feels like there’s more on Junhui’s mind than Wonwoo’s words.

“It’s just that you guys are going to school now right?” Wonwoo continues. “So when you or Junhui wake up,” Wonwoo stares at Mingyu since Junhui refuses to look up, “you make us wake up, even when we don’t need to be up.”

“Wow, how sad,” Mingyu’s voice drips with sarcasm. “Must suck waking up only to actually have the option to go back to sleep.”

“Okay salt mine,” Wonwoo scoffs, “let’s calm down. You’ve been spending too much time with Minghao.” Wonwoo pauses, the three of them smiling a bit when they hear a disgruntled “hey!” from the kitchen. “I mean it in the opposite way too. Minghao and I stay up longer than you do – even if you’re studying. And we’re disruptive too, keeping you away from sleeping and studying. Wouldn’t it be better then, to group us together so we can only disrupt each other while you two focus on work?”

“I guess that make sense,” Mingyu thinks out loud.

“It would only be a temporary arrangement,” Wonwoo sooths, kicking Junhui’s leg from under the table. “After that we can switch back. That okay?”

“Yeah,” Junhui says softly. “That’s okay.” The Chinese male pauses for a bit, contemplating something in his head, before a genuine smile makes its way onto his face. “Thanks for looking out for us Won.”

“It’s what I do,” Wonwoo says with a flourish, though Mingyu knows it’s merely to distract them from the fact that his neck is turning red. “What would you do without me?”

“Probably live longer because you won’t give me as much stress,” Mingyu says thoughtfully. Junhui laughs at that, and they exchange a high five.

“That was rude,” Wonwoo points at Mingyu. “I’ve practically raised you at this point. I don’t deserve this kind of disrespect.” Mingyu shrugs. “Whatever, I’m going to move my stuff into your room now since it’s cleaner.” Stalking off not unlike a cat, Wonwoo enters his and Junhui’s shared room.

“Why do _I_ have to move?” Mingyu whines, thrashing around slightly in his seat.

“I can move if you want,” Junhui offers. “I’ll move Minghao’s stuff too if you want.”

“You’re too nice,” Mingyu shakes his head. “It’s okay I was just complaining. Minghao would probably hang me from the roof if we touched his stuff without asking. Besides, my room still smells like cinnamon from the last project I had to do and it’s not pleasant anymore. Don’t tell Wonwoo.”

“My lips are zipped,” Junhui grins. “Though he’ll figure it out once he gets settled in, won’t he?”

“The smell is subtle enough,” Mingyu shrugs. “He won’t notice it until later tonight when he’s not distracted by other things. It’s still strong enough to drive you insane though. Minghao sleeps with his face stuffed into his pillow – sprayed with your perfume every night if I saw the bottle properly.”

“That’s why my perfume has been being used up so quickly,” Junhui frowns.

“I’m sure he’ll buy you a new one if you ask,” Mingyu pats Junhui’s shoulder comfortingly. “Anyways, Wonwoo will have to deal with that now. By the end of the semester the smell should be gone so I won’t have to suffer cinnamon-induced nightmares every night.”

“What do cinnamon-induced nightmares even feel like?” Junhui blinks owlishly.

“Bad,” Mingyu answers simply. He turns to face Junhui directly, face settling into a more serious expression before he opens his mouth to speak. “Are you okay?”

“I’m fine,” Junhui answers automatically.

“That’s a lie,” Mingyu sighs. “You seem sad today. And when Wonwoo suggested moving rooms you didn’t sound like you were joking when you pouted.”

“Oh,” Junhui lets out a breath of air, chest deflating and shoulders lowering. “Was it that obvious?”

“Huh?” Mingyu blinks, confused.

“Well, if you noticed, I’m definitely losing my touch,” Junhui explains. “You’re not exactly the most observant one in this apartment.”

“Are you calling me slow?” Mingyu asks, slightly offended.

“Are you really questioning it?” Junhui shoots back, a devilish smile making its way onto his face. Mingyu groans at that, pinching the bridge of his nose. What had he done to deserve so many snarky roommates? “As I thought,” Junhui says triumphantly. “Anyways,” he continues, calming down. “It’s just stress you know? From school. This class was supposed to be easy but I got this TA from hell and he marks insanely strict. It’s annoying. Like, I’m not _failing_ , but I have to put so much more work into these projects than I originally planned, and that takes a lot of time so I’m just, kind of scrambling to get my time management down again.”

“Ah,” Mingyu says, not really sure what to say. Junhui never really complained about his schoolwork. The older boy was one of the smarter ones in his class. His usual aloof attitude was nowhere to be found whenever he was programming. This time though, things had to be more serious. Or maybe not, Mingyu finds himself realizing when Junhui grins at him clumsily. “Well, it’s summer, you probably feel like you should be playing around and not working huh?”

“Exactly!” Junhui nods aggressively. “I feel like I should be lazing around even though I’ve gotten a job or internship for the last couple of summers so this shouldn’t be any different. It’s just hard to work in the summer time, I don’t know. I guess we’re going to have to get used to it though huh?” Junhui frowns, a soft whine escaping his lips. “I don’t want to be an adult Gyu. I don’t want to have to go to work every morning and do the same thing with no changes. I won’t even _get_ a summer vacation then!”

“It’s alright,” Mingyu says. “Things will work out. Besides, that’s why you went into your majors isn’t it? You didn’t want a normal 9 to 5 job so you took one where you could always discover new things and have fun stuff to work with, no?”

“Yeah,” Junhui sighs. “I guess I did. I can’t believe you remembered that.”

“It was important to you, so it’s important to me,” Mingyu says, brushing some of Junhui’s hair out of his face. “Anyways, I know every once in a while, the future creeps up on us and we just kind of get lost into this deep pit of despair and fear but listen, I’m here for you, we’re here for you. Even if things don’t seem like they’re working out now, they’re going to. Sometimes you’re going to have to get off the main path and trek through the forest in order to reach your goal, but trust me, as long as you’re moving forwards with a destination in mind, you’ll get there – whether or not it follows your original plan or not.”

“Wow, that was actually pretty insightful,” Junhui says, surprise colouring his voice.

“Hey,” Mingyu frowns. “That’s mean.”

“I mean, he’s not wrong,” Minghao’s voice pipes up. Mingyu looks up as Junhui turns around to see Minghao leaning on the doorway. “You are kind of not the insightful type,” Minghao points at Mingyu. “But also,” Minghao turns so his finger is now pointing at Junhui, “you need to stop thinking about these kinds of things by yourself. I know they’re inevitable, and me just telling you to stop won’t actually make it stop, but it’ll help if you speak up about them. Just talk about it, even if I’m reading a book or not really listening – formulating ideas into words will help you think about them clearly.”

“I know,” Junhui’s lips pull into a straight line, not quite a frown, but not a happy neutral either. “But like you said, just because you tell me to talk to you about it doesn’t make it any easier for me to do that.”

“Touché,” Minghao nods. “But if I keep reminding you, hopefully it’ll make it easier.”

“I guess you’re right,” Junhui yawns.

“Hey, you said touché! That makes you just as irrelevant as me!” Mingyu cheers.

“Mingyu, that’s mean,” Junhui scolds, reaching up to pull at Mingyu’s ear.

“Ow,” Mingyu grimaces at the pain, “Junhui! Minghao said it to me first!”

“No, I didn’t,” Minghao sidles up next to Junhui, eyes wide and innocent. His voice raises in pitch, giving it a cutesier edge than normal. “Mingyu’s just stressed and taking it out on me. I think he needs to sleep.”

“You little,” Mingyu starts, reaching around Junhui to grab at Minghao’s smirking face.

“Now, now children,” Junhui stops Mingyu mid-reach. He grabs Mingyu’s hands and entwined them with his own before tugging Mingyu away from his revenge. “I’m tired too. Let’s hurry up and get those mattresses switched and then we can sleep.”

“But,” Mingyu starts looking back to see Minghao sticking his tongue out at him.

“I’m sleepy Mingyu,” Junhui says, voice raising into a whine. Staring at the now childish Junhui, Mingyu wonders if acting cute in order to get their way was just a foreign thing to do. “Don’t you want to sleep with me?”

“Uh,” Mingyu opens his mouth to respond, only to lack the brain power to do so. Maybe he was tired.

“Mingyu get your head out of the gutter and move your things,” Wonwoo calls, appearing at the doorway with his hands on his hips. Minghao bursts out laughing as Mingyu flushes. Laughing as well, Junhui – the traitor – pulls Mingyu forwards. Pouting, Mingyu begrudgingly follows Junhui into his own room and begins to pack up his things. Maybe Junhui wasn’t on his side after all.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I was going to end this talking about frozen blueberries because they're a good snack when you're dieting (and I am trying to lose weight) but my mom doesn't think they taste good but the chapter was like, "Yeah I don't like that idea" and just went in a totally different direction oops.
> 
> Also guess whose going to see Seventeen in Toronto and got a HiTouch? :DDDD I don't know what to do honestly I think I'm just going to scream and run past them while high fiving them like I hope I'll at least have the courage to look at their faces while doing it...
> 
>   
> Hope you're smiling!  
> 
> 
>   
> ~ alateni  
> 


	11. pretty in pink

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Junhui is sick and messed up his dye job, but that doesn't mean he has to feel down.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm bad at chapter summaries (and summaries in general) but it looks weird without it there. Which is also why I'm writing random things here - it feels weird without it. Oops.

Looking at the mirror, Junhui tugs at his newly dyed locks. He isn’t opposed to the colour, in fact, the pastel pink hair sits nicely on his head, shaping his face well. It makes him look softer, the pastel colour dulling the sharper lines of his face – and Junhui can’t say he doesn’t like it. Though most thought he was attractive in a rugged, almost piercing way, Junhui likes this new look. It takes away some of the darker spots on his face, making him look brighter and more youthful. Junhui was often told that his gaze was piercing in a way, and that made people assume he was a suave, flirty man – which couldn’t be further from the truth.

In actuality, Junhui couldn’t talk his way past anyone. All of his friends agree that Junhui should never be left alone to fend for himself. The boy was too gullible, too trusting, and infinitely too weird and shy in front of strangers to be able to survive without a little bit of instruction. That isn’t to say that Junhui is helpless – he’s survived this long after all – it’s just that, out of everyone, Junhui would be the first to receive help without asking.

“I guess it’s not too bad,” Junhui shrugs, leaning away from the bathroom counter. He eyes the various bottles of dye on the table and sighs, thinking about the mess he’s going to have to clean. He isn’t new to dyeing his own hair, heck, he’s helped Minghao dye his hair plenty of times too – it’s just this time, he may have messed up a little bit.

The colour he had initially picked up was a strawberry brown – but that was before Junhui realized his hair was still blond. Wonwoo had reminded him before he left the house, that his hair was lighter than the average brown or black, so he should look for hair dyes that matched his bleached hair. Unfortunately, Junhui let it slip to the back of his mind as he got distracted by the various colours and shades at his disposal. As such, Junhui grabbed the wrong bottle and only realized his mistake after putting it in. Panicking, Junhui decided he could probably cancel out the darker colour with a lighter shade of brown – only to use the remaining amount of pink dye from Minghao’s last hairstyle (which happened to be a cute combination of blue and pink).

And now he’s met with this, odd pastel pink hair colour that edges more towards brown. He’s not completely sure how the colours ended up mixing out to get here, but well, what’s done is done. Junhui can’t change it – dyeing one’s hair too much in a short amount of time is bad anyways.

Yawning, Junhui decides to get cleaning. Throwing the gloves and empty bottles into the trash, the boy wipes down the counters. Luckily, none of the dye had gotten anywhere but on the trash bag Junhui put out, so it was pretty simple to collect everything and throw it out. The only thing was that now Junhui had two bottles of unfinished dye (one from the new set he bought and the other was from Minghao’s pink hair dye) rather than one. Deciding to just throw it under the counter with the other half-empty hair dye bottles, Junhui shuts the door close and looks at himself in the mirror.

Tugging at his hair again, Junhui’s eyes travel down towards the cupboard. “We should probably clean those out,” the boy says absentmindedly. Though Wonwoo and Mingyu usually stuck with natural shades of brown or black (except for that one time Wonwoo decided to go mint for whatever reason), they had still managed to gather a rather extensive collection of hair dye. They probably should’ve thrown it out years ago, with some of the ones at the back possibly rotting, but Junhui hates throwing out things he can still use, and so he put them there, with the promise of using it again in the future. Obviously, that didn’t happen.

Pushing that problem out of his head for another day (like he had done so many times before), Junhui steps out of the bathroom and wanders around the apartment. His other housemates were still out, participating in some event run by the café down the street. Junhui would’ve came too, but the boy had gotten sick earlier that week and though it was minor, he was still a bit stuffy so the others told him to stay at home. Granted, they never said he couldn’t do other stuff – just not go with them to the café.

Okay, maybe what they really meant was for Junhui to rest up at home and get better but come on, everyone knows Junhui is a clingy, affectionate person – even he knew that. Therefore, Junhui concludes that you can’t exactly get mad at him for rebelling _especially_ since not even one of his lovers had stayed at home to take care for him. Though, now that Junhui thinks about it, could going out and getting hair dye really count as an act of rebellion? Whatever, all that matters is the intention, and Junhui had definitely _intended_ to rebel.

Humming to himself, Junhui’s thoughts are interrupted be a coughing spree. The male bends over, clutching at the counter for balance, and hacks out one shuddering cough after the next. Alright, maybe he should’ve taken Mingyu’s advice and stayed in bed today, but Junhui wasn’t admitting that anytime soon. After recovering, Junhui immediately goes to pour himself a glass of water. There’s left over chicken noodle soup on the stove – made from scratch by Mingyu – that Junhui begins to heat up. Watching as the stove top begins to turn red, Junhui smiles. Minghao and Mingyu had fought (what was new?) about the soup that morning, with Minghao insisting that chicken wasn’t good for sick people while Mingyu argued that everyone ate chicken noodle soup when they were ill. In the end, Mingyu was the chef and since Minghao didn’t know how to cook any other type of soup, Junhui was left with chicken. Not that he minded, he liked to eat anything and everything.

After heating up the soup and pouring himself a bowl, Junhui retreats to the couch. Propping himself in between two pillows, the Chinese male turns the TV on and absentmindedly scrolls through the channels while the soup cools. Once he’s found a decent show (it’s a rerun actually, of one of Junhui’s favourite shows – the boy could probably quote the episode word for word), Junhui digs in.

“Fuck,” Junhui moans, closing his eyes and relishing the taste of chicken in his mouth. He’d be a liar if he didn’t think Mingyu was the best chef in the world, and for the boy to make something especially for Junhui? Husband material right there. In fact, after finding out that Mingyu was majoring in culinary arts, Junhui had been prepared to propose on the spot. And he probably would’ve, had Wonwoo not kicked him to the side and confirmed that yes, they had an extra room available, and of course, Mingyu could look into renting it.

After finishing his food – and lamenting at how quickly it had disappeared – Junhui sets the bowl and spoon onto the table, far too lazy to get up and wash it. His headache from this morning was coming back, so the boy snuggles deeper into the pile of pillows and blankets he had made for himself. Combined with the warmth from the food and the tell-tale soreness of being sick, Junhui soon drifts off to sleep, the white noise from the TV lulling him into unconsciousness.

 

“Mingyu!” Junhui is awoken later on – he can’t recall when he fell asleep, and his eyes are still closed so there’s no way of figuring out what time it is – by Minghao’s voice. Junhui resists the urge to smile, already able to sense the annoyance in Minghao’s voice. He hears Mingyu respond – the words muffled by the blankets surrounding Junhui’s ears. There are footsteps, clanging of pots in the kitchen, before Junhui hears Minghao call Mingyu’s name again. Deciding that he was far too curious to pretend to be asleep, Junhui opens his eyes slowly.

The first thing he registers is the aching of his body. The headache was gone, but all his muscles and joints felt sore – as if he had gone for a marathon the day before. Groaning at the feeling, Junhui feels something shift beside him, and it takes him a moment to focus his gaze on the body sitting on the floor in front of the couch. Wonwoo is on his knees, clearing Junhui’s bowl before noticing the stare on him. Turning slightly, Wonwoo smiles fondly at the sick bundle of Junhui on the couch. Junhui whines again, louder this time, and pouts – trying to express to the other man that he wanted to be held and pet.

“Junhui’s awake guys,” Wonwoo calls, putting the bowl back down. He shifts closer, untangling some of the blankets from Junhui’s form. “You’re heating up,” Wonwoo explains when Junhui complains about the lack of warmth, “you don’t need to be hotter.”

“I know,” Junhui sniffles, “it’s ‘cause I’m already hot enough.”

“Okay,” Wonwoo replies. Junhui pouts, unhappy with the dismissive tone in Wonwoo’s voice, but the slender male pulls him closer and plays with his hair so Junhui soon forgets what he was mad about in the first place. “Did you eat anything?”

“The soup,” Junhui answers. “It was good.”

“You think everything is good,” Wonwoo reminds, patting Junhui’s shoulder jokingly. “Remember what Minghao said? You’re happiest when you’re sleeping or eating – you’re practically a cat.”

“I’m _sick_ ,” Junhui whines, “you should be nice to me!”

“Of course,” Wonwoo grins. “I’m always nice.”

Junhui opens his mouth to retort, only to start coughing again. Wonwoo’s amused gaze turns into one of concern, moving his hands to rub Junhui’s back as the boy continues to cough into the blankets. Standing up, Wonwoo fixes Junhui into a sitting position before placing a hand on the other boy’s forehead. Muttering to himself, Wonwoo’s eyebrows scrunch together as he looks at Junhui worriedly, only for Junhui to reach a hand out and smooth out Wonwoo’s wrinkles.

“You’re going to look old,” Junhui giggles when Wonwoo gives him an affronted look. “Not that you don’t already.”

“Hey!” Wonwoo complains, but his voice has no bite. “You’re the same age as me.”

“But I look young,” Junhui snuggles closer to Wonwoo. “Dermatologists hate me.”

“Of course,” Wonwoo laughs.

“Yo,” Minghao pops his head through the doorway, causing Junhui and Wonwoo to look up. “Food is ready. Do you want to come here or should we feed you over there?”

“Mmmm,” Junhui thinks for a bit, looking between Wonwoo and Minghao before coming to a decision. “I want Haohao to feed me.”

“Wha-” Minghao splutters, the tips of his ears turning red. It makes Junhui smile. Minghao always acted so tough, as if nothing bothered him and everyone was a nuisance. In reality though? The boy loved to be pampered and coddled. Minghao was probably the biggest baby out of the three of them – and that was counting one clingy Junhui and one clumsy Mingyu. And so, whenever he could, Junhui would take advantage of it. Minghao constantly pretended that he couldn’t care less about whether someone hugged or took care of him – but Junhui knew. The younger boy was just a little shy about it all, not used to being shown so much affection, especially by three other loving boys (though, Junhui snorts internally, Wonwoo might not count).

“You heard the man,” Mingyu appears suddenly, placing a bowl in Minghao’s hands and pushing him towards Junhui. Wonwoo laughs at the betrayed expression on Minghao’s face, before getting up and moving Junhui so he was more comfortable. Walking over to Minghao, the older boy pats him on the shoulder before disappearing into the kitchen with Mingyu.

“I’m waiting,” Junhui sings, eyeing Minghao expectantly. The younger boy flushes, whole face a pretty pink, before stalking over – not unlike a petulant kitten. “What did Mingyu make Hao?”

“Food,” Minghao replies stiffly. Junhui grins at that. Looks like Minghao was going to pretend he was annoyed at all of them – despite everyone knowing that Minghao quite enjoyed taking care of other people. Maybe it was because he was an only child, but Junhui always noticed that Minghao liked to be in charge of others. Whether it was looking after them or making sure they were healthy, Minghao was easily one of the more responsible and mature members of their little family. The younger boy had even admitted to Junhui (though he was drunk at the time) that he had always wanted a younger sibling to baby – and Junhui can understand why.

He, himself, had a younger sibling. As did Wonwoo and Mingyu. Between the three of them, they were used to taking care of other people, of being the responsible one – the one that got blamed for everything. So, it was kind of a nice change. Here they got to be the one being taken care of – while Minghao fulfilled his desire to be responsible for someone, Mingyu, Junhui, and Wonwoo were able to take things easy and not have to constantly feel like the experiment child.

In contrast, things worked out quite well for Minghao too. Even though he got to finally experience the role of a caretaker, he was still an only child. Junhui had noticed, over his years of talking and meeting many people, that there were many differences between being an only child and having a sibling – and these were highlighted even in someone as mature as Minghao. The younger boy was used to being spoiled, though not in the regular sense. He didn’t have money flowing from his taps, but he also never had to split things with others. Minghao never had to deal with hand-me-downs, with splitting the last slice of cake, with working together with your sibling to hide the vase you accidentally broke – as such, Minghao was also used to being pampered. And with three older brothers in the house, Minghao got as much pampering as he could ever want.

“Junhui,” Minghao sighs, bringing Junhui out of his mind. The older boy wandered sometimes, not really much of a talkative person. He was often up in his own thoughts, thinking about weird things and acting on them – leading others to describe him as odd, not really used to having to deal with his antics. Whenever he got sick though, it got even worse. Often, he would find himself missing out on entire conversations and even hours of the day, so caught up in the stuffiness of his mind brought about by his sickness.

“Junhui,” Minghao says.

“Oh,” Junhui’s eyes widen. Like that, it had happened again. “Sorry.”

“It’s alright,” Minghao gives Junhui a small smile, used to his ways. While others would turn away, citing that Junhui wasn’t what they expected him to be, the Chinese male could always rely on Minghao. Minghao was understanding. The younger boy stuck with Junhui no matter what, saying things like ‘if I don’t take care of him, who will?’ to mask the love he had for the older male. Not even Mingyu or Wonwoo did that. They loved Junhui as well, but everyone had their faults. While Wonwoo could sit with Junhui in silence for years and be content, Mingyu would rather die. While Mingyu could keep up with Junhui’s random bouts of energy, Minghao would rather sit down and watch. And so Minghao was the only one who could deal with Junhui’s antics – with his weird sense of humour and actions. The others dealt with him to an extent, but there was only so much they could take before rolling their eyes and pushing him towards Minghao.

It didn’t bother him, he understood that to be in a relationship did not mean relying solely on the other partner (or, in this case, partners). Relationships were about giving and giving – not giving only to take. So, Junhui didn’t feel hurt, instead, he felt grateful. He was happy that he had managed to find three people that would love and take care of him no matter what. And that’s how they worked. When one couldn’t find it in himself to help, there was always two more backing them up. No matter what, you could find someone to care for you and listen – and that’s what Junhui appreciated the most.

“Junhui, honey,” Minghao clinks the spoon he was holding against the side of the bowl. “You’re going to have to actually open your mouth if you want me to feed you, you realize that right?” Junhui snorts, always amused by Minghao’s blunt way of saying things, before opening his mouth and allowing Minghao to spoon feed him.

Behind him, he can hear Mingyu and Wonwoo laughing about something in the kitchen. It was nice, to be separated for once. While they always tried to make sure there was open communication between everyone so no one would get left out, sometimes just being alone with one person was nice. It kind of strengthened bonds, in Junhui’s opinion at least. After all, if you want to tighten something, you have to do it one by one – there’s no way you can do it all at once. So, Junhui always made an effort to spend some alone time with each and every one of his lovers. Things were always fun and warm when they were altogether, but there was a different dynamic when it was just two of them that made Junhui realize just how much he loved Minghao, Wonwoo, and Mingyu individually.

In the end though, they always ended up as a group. Which is why Junhui was currently watching Wonwoo and Mingyu wrestle on the ground in front of Junhui’s bed. Minghao is perched on Wonwoo’s bed, counting score whenever Mingyu or Wonwoo manage to hold the other person down. Junhui grins when Minghao announces Wonwoo as the winner – laughing at the way Mingyu screams in indignation.

“No way!” Mingyu complains, standing up as Wonwoo cheers tiredly from the ground. “He’s way skinnier than me – I definitely won!”

“Were you the one counting score Gyu?” Minghao asks haughtily. “Looks like you’re going to have to actually work out at the gym instead of taking pictures of yourself in the mirror.”

“I do _not_ do that Minghao!” Mingyu growls, lunging forwards and tackling Minghao. The two younger gym buddies roll around on Wonwoo’s bed, narrowly avoiding falling off a couple of times. Junhui reminds them to be careful, though his weak voice probably isn’t heard over the sounds of their thrashing.

Feeling a dip in the bed beside him, Junhui turns to see Wonwoo lean into his side. The other boy has his eyes closed, a sleepy and content expression making its way onto his face. Midterms had just arrived in the world that was university – meaning Wonwoo was busy both preparing for his own and getting his students ready for theirs. Such was the life of a TA after all, and though Wonwoo complained, Junhui knew he enjoyed teaching almost as he liked reading. Junhui couldn’t imagine why, he was terrible at teaching – his thinking was often too abstract for others to grasp and he had a hard time formulating his thoughts into words (there was a reason he wasn’t an English major) – but Wonwoo, Wonwoo had a knack for it. He made even the most complicated concepts simple. Heck, Wonwoo could probably teach a dog calculus (and he did, back when Mingyu accidentally took a calculus course in his second year – he had ended up dropping it, though Junhui wasn’t sure why he didn’t do it sooner, but still managed to pass the first test with Wonwoo’s help despite not having taken calculus in high school).

“Guys, stop fighting,” Wonwoo calls, though Junhui can hear that he doesn’t particularly care. The two cease their thrashing however, and Junhui muffles a laugh into Wonwoo’s shoulder when he sees how messed up their hair was.

“Your hair is a mess,” he tells them. Mingyu shrugs, leaning on his arms and kicking his legs lightly by the side of the bed. Minghao makes a half-hearted attempt to clean his hair up, before shrugging as well and flopping onto the bed.

“You dyed your hair Jun,” Minghao says instead. “And I know Wonwoo, it’s obvious. We didn’t get to talk about it before though.”

“I wasn’t going to say anything like that,” Wonwoo insists, but stops talking when Mingyu, Junhui, and Minghao all give him an unconvinced look.

“I did,” Junhui continues, patting Wonwoo’s thigh comfortingly. “Does it look good?”

“Yes,” Wonwoo answers. He picks his hand up and runs his fingers through the freshly dyed locks. “You look good in pink. Almost as good as you did in purple.”

“Anything’s better than that terrible bleached blond you had before,” Minghao drawls, rolling onto his back. He stares up at the ceiling, tracing unseen patterns with his fingers, before Mingyu reaches over and takes Minghao’s hand into his own.

“That’s mean, I thought he looked good in it,” Mingyu chides. “Junhui has the kind of face where he’d look good in everything.”

“You’re his boyfriend,” Minghao rolls his eyes, “you _have_ to say that.”

“Might I remind you,” Wonwoo snickers, “that you are too?”

“But I’m not fake like Gyu is,” Minghao comments. Mingyu huffs, leaning over to tickle Minghao’s exposed belly. The younger shrieks, curling in on himself. He ends up rolling away – and almost falls off the bed had Mingyu not grabbed at the back of his shirt last minute.

“I’m glad you think it looks nice,” Junhui says a while later. They’re all staring at the ceiling, content with just laying there. “I kind of messed up and wasn’t sure if a softer colour would look good on me.”

“Nah, you look pretty in pink,” Wonwoo pipes up. “Though you seem very pink right now because you’re sick.”

“Once you get better it’ll look even… better,” Mingyu says. “I can’t think of another word.”

“It’s alright, we all know you have a limited ass vocabulary,” Minghao pats Mingyu’s chest patronizingly. The taller boy groans, but does nothing in retaliation. Sometimes, in terms of dealing with Minghao, you just had to learn to roll with the blows.

“Which reminds me,” Wonwoo continues. “Did you take your medicine Junnie?”

“I did,” Junhui mumbles, his sentence interrupted with a yawn. “Minghao gave it to me.”

“That I did,” Minghao nods.

“Good,” Wonwoo brings his hand over to Junhui’s face and strokes the other’s cheek gently. “Are you sleepy? Maybe we should let you get some rest.”

“It sucks that I got sick around midterms,” Junhui complains.

“At least you don’t have any this week,” Minghao reminds, sitting up. “Get rested and get better and you’ll be right as rain to write all your fun tests next week.”

“Yay,” Junhui replies dryly, wrinkling his nose. Mingyu laughs at that, before pushing Minghao to make room for himself.

“We’ll leave you be then,” Mingyu says, grabbing Minghao’s hand. “Wonwoo you should sleep too, you look like you’re about to die – no offense.”

“Gyu, you can’t say no offense after you’ve said something offensive,” Minghao chides, but Mingyu shrugs and pulls the skinny boy into a hug.

“Says you,” Mingyu mutters into Minghao’s hair. “You say offensive things all the time.”

“Yeah but I don’t apologize for them,” Minghao points out. Wonwoo laughs, nose crinkling and tired eyes brightening slightly. “Anyways, Gyu is right – for once. I want both of you going to bed within the next hour, no complaints. Wonwoo doesn’t have another midterm until next week too.”

“Technically I have marking to do,” Wonwoo says, “but that can wait for later.” Minghao nods, making Wonwoo and Junhui laugh. “What about you two?”

“I’m going to the library,” Minghao says. “I have some last minute cramming to do for my midterm tomorrow.”

“I’ll tag along,” Mingyu poses the sentence more like a question, and only relaxes when Minghao nods. “I have an assignment to start. It’s not due until later in the week but I don’t want to bother you two.”

“Good luck then,” Junhui sniffs, already getting underneath his covers. “After midterms and when I’m better maybe we can all go on a trip to celebrate.”

“That would be nice,” Wonwoo agrees, smiling easily when Junhui brightens at the idea. “We’ll talk about it later. For now, we’ve got stuff to do.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you don't think Junhui looked good in his soft pink hair, turn on your location. I just want to talk.
> 
> Anyways, someone commented before that I haven't been doing Junhui enough justice in this fic and I agree. I'm very Minghao-biased and am a major sucker for GyuHao so most of the happenings here deal with that. Even before I realized that Junhui isn't getting enough love (which is weird considering I'm so soft for him) so here's a little chapter to try and make up for that? I'm going to try and spread the attention to the other members as well because it's an OT4 and I love all of them but excuse my Minghao-biasing ways. I am but a mere human.
> 
> Also, I got sick around midterms too. TT^TT I had to write two tests with a stuffy nose and right now I have a cough. Luckily I'm on reading week but I've got another midterm after this week so I hope I get better quickly ;;A;;
> 
>   
> Hope you're smiling!  
> 
> 
>   
> ~ alateni  
> 


	12. one of those days

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Today is one of those days.

Junhui wakes up and he knows, it’s one of those days. He doesn’t know what the time is, and honestly, it doesn’t matter. Rolling over in bed, Junhui sighs, thrusting his face back into his pillow. He closes his eyes and holds his breath for as long as he can. When he can’t take it anymore, he rolls back over and inhales deeply. Scrunching his eyes shut, Junhui rearranges his blanket over his body and curls into a ball. He opens his eyes slowly, letting them adjust to the light.

The heavy curtains Wonwoo bought do their job, letting just enough light in so Junhui could see the empty bed across from him, but not enough where he’d wake up with sunlight in his face. Examining the hastily made bed, Junhui idly remembers that Wonwoo had an early class today. Sighing, Junhui turns back around. He squeezes the blankets around himself, trying his best to squeeze out the numbing feeling inside, but to no avail. It was, after all, one of those days.

 

This time, Junhui wakes up to his phone falling. The male rubs at his eyes, yawning. This time, he checks the clock. It hangs on the other wall, just above the door. 2:16 PM. Junhui’s done worse, but it definitely wasn’t a good sign. Reaching over, Junhui’s fingers slide across the hardwood floor for a couple of moments before they grasp his phone. Bringing it up, Junhui turns the device on, and finds that he’s slept through most of his alarms. Oh well. His classes weren’t that important.

Dismissing the alarms, Junhui scrolls through his notifications. There were the regular ones – daily Snapchats from people he knew back in high school but barely talked to anymore, a couple of notifications from Instagram, two messages from his cell phone provider, and oh, one from Mingyu. Clicking on the text, Junhui’s eyes scan through it tiredly. Falling back asleep had done nothing but make him sleepier. In fact, it had the opposite effect. Instead of feeling refreshed, Junhui felt angry. Angry at himself for falling asleep and wasting the day away. Angry that he couldn’t even wake up for his class. Angry that he couldn’t find the motivation to do anything but continue laying in bed – even though half the day had passed by.

Shaking himself out of his thoughts, Junhui reads the message. All of his housemates were, apparently, gone for the day. Junhui, being the only one with a later class, was left to sleep in when Mingyu made Wonwoo and Minghao breakfast. Luckily, Mingyu was always one to think ahead – at least in terms of feeding his loved ones – and had made an extra portion for Junhui. It was sitting on the kitchen counter. At least, it should be, according to Mingyu’s text.

Junhui sighs, throwing the phone onto the dresser next to his bed, and curls into himself. He was supposed to get up at 11 – the food was, without a doubt, cold by now. Rolling away to face the wall, Junhui groans. He squishes his face into the pillow, reveling in the cold feeling, before the numbness came back. It was odd, a mixture of two contrasting emotions. On one hand, Junhui felt empty. He didn’t want to get up. He didn’t want to eat. He just wanted to sleep – but he had already slept so much. And that’s when the anger kicked in. Although, Junhui thinks, it’s more akin to disappointment than anger.

Junhui was a disappointment – that’s all he could feel. It was either that, or nothing. And yet, even though he knew he should get up, shower, do something productive to chase the feelings away, he couldn’t. Instead, he goes back to sleep.

 

Opening his eyes, Junhui sees that there’s more light peeking into the room than there was before. He sighs, feeling his chest fall downwards, before inhaling deeply. He does this a couple of times, just feeling his muscles as he breathes. Rolling over, Junhui grabs at his phone. There are a couple more mindless notifications, but one catches his eye. A text from Jihoon.

Eyes widening, Junhui clicks on the message. Jihoon barely messages people – preferring to call or talk in person. Reading through the words, Junhui cringes. He checks the time, 3:27 PM. Jihoon had sent his first text 20 minutes ago, asking about where Junhui was – seeing as he hadn’t come to class. The second text, sent only a few minutes ago, was an invitation to grab a late lunch. Junhui considers it. He hasn’t seen Jihoon in a long time, with the both of them busy with school and other projects. He always appreciated spending time with Jihoon too, the other boy being one of the only friends Junhui had who accepted his quirks and thoughts without a second thought. However, at the thought of getting out of bed, Junhui falters.

He hasn’t showered yet. He hasn’t showered in a couple of days actually. He has to brush his teeth, fix his clothes – just imagining the motions of getting ready makes Junhui more tired than he already is. Ignoring the messages, Junhui clicks on his Instagram instead, scrolling mindlessly through posts in an attempt to escape the numbness. Not long after however, the app closes due to an incoming phone call. Lee Jihoon is the name on the top of the screen. Junhui freezes.

He considers picking up, considers accepting the invitation and getting up. Junhui knows it’ll be good for him. To actually get up, walk outside and talk to someone – to do something productive would improve his mood considerably. But he can’t. He wants to cry, to laugh at himself, but all he can do is place the phone down and curl into a ball. He can’t even find it in himself to decline the call. Instead, he leaves it to go to voicemail and hides. He hides underneath the blankets and ignores the curling anger in his gut – anger at himself. Never at anyone else, because it’s Junhui that’s the one who can’t do anything other than lay in bed and waste away.

Mentally, Junhui apologizes. He knows Jihoon wouldn’t mind either way, but he has to say it. Has to imagine the scenario in which he can actually muster the energy to get up and call him back, just to apologize. He isn’t feeling up to it today. After all, today is one of those days.

 

Deciding he needed to eat something, Junhui crawls out of bed. It’s guilt, rather than hunger, that motivates him. He feels bad, knowing Mingyu cooked for him – only for it to go to waste. So, even though he felt nauseous, Junhui forces himself to walk out of his and Wonwoo’s room and into the kitchen. Once arriving there, the male sighs. The apartment felt empty. It always did whenever he was the only one home – but today, it feels even worse. Idly, Junhui wonders if he should text someone. He knows reaching out will help. To tell Mingyu, Wonwoo, Minghao, even responding Jihoon would help Junhui feel like a functioning human being. But he can’t bring himself to do it.

Instead, Junhui sits down, eyeing the cold food. An omelette with toast and butter – simple but to the point. Junhui knows Mingyu makes each omelette different. Minghao likes mushrooms and ham in his, but Wonwoo prefers plain cheese. Mingyu loaded Junhui’s with vegetables – onions, peppers, mushrooms, and all – because he knew Junhui never ate vegetables unless they were mixed with something else. And usually, it worked. Today however, Junhui could barely finish half of the omelette. Gnawing on a piece of toast, Junhui finishes a quarter of it only to wrap the food up and place it in the fridge. He’d eat it later, when he wasn’t feeling so numb.

 

Junhui doesn’t remember falling asleep again. Honestly, Junhui doesn’t even remember getting back into his bed. Regardless, he flops onto his back and stares up at the ceiling. He feels frustrated, angry that he can’t do anything about how he was feeling. Reaching over to grab his phone, Junhui scrolls through the new notifications, before noticing the time. 6:33 PM. The day was officially over for anyone with a job. Junhui hadn’t even showered.

Placing the phone down, Junhui rolls onto his stomach. He stares at the wall in front of him, the light in the room diminishing as the sun set, before punching the wall violently. It doesn’t do any damage, and the slight stinging in Junhui’s hand doesn’t make him feel any different. Junhui sighs. He didn’t have the energy for anything anymore. Not even pain. Rolling onto his back, Junhui feels frustrated tears build. And yet, even when he wants to cry and feel _something_ , the tears refuse to fall. After a while, they disappear and Junhui is left feeling nothing. As always. Today is one of those days.

 

Junhui dozes off again, not quite enough to call it sleeping, but he definitely isn’t awake. He’s hovering, not sure what to do with himself. He needs to get up. Needs to figure out what he missed in class, needs to drink some water, needs to shower and change his clothes. Needs to do something, _anything_ that’ll make him feel less like a failure and more like himself. He doesn’t.

He never does.

It’s one of those days.

 

That is, until someone comes home. It jolts him into alertness, ears perking to try and figure out who it was. Junhui doesn’t know why he’s surprised. In all honesty, he should’ve been more concerned with the fact that no one had come home yet. Regardless, Junhui holds his breath. He isn’t sure why he’s scared of being caught, but he is. He feels like a little kid again, disappointing his parents by acting like he was sick in order to stay home from school. He feels a little lost, a lot numb, and nothing in between. It’s almost suffocating, how long it takes for the door to open and someone to poke their head in. And when they do, Junhui recognizes Minghao’s face and almost breaks down.

He doesn’t however. Instead, he stills, pretending to be sleeping even though his body is stiff and tense. Closing his eyes in hopes of Minghao leaving him alone, Junhui waits. He counts his breath, once, twice, three times now – and then the door closes and Minghao is gone. Breathing out slowly, Junhui opens his eyes. He wonders, absentmindedly, if he would be happier had Minghao stayed. If Minghao noticed Junhui was awake, and asked what was wrong – would Junhui have told him? Or would he have dismissed him, joked around saying he was just taking a nap, and shooed Minghao off with a hurried ‘I’m fine’? He’d never know, Junhui guesses.

 

Junhui is wrong.

 

Minghao comes back less than five minutes later. In his hands is a cup of water. Junhui is caught, with his blanket around his waist and hands on his phone, but Minghao doesn’t say anything. Instead, Minghao comes closer, setting the water on the table, and softly pushing Junhui to one side of the bed. Slipping in, Minghao gently takes the phone from Junhui’s hands and places it on the dresser, before gathering the older male into his arms. He doesn’t say anything, and Junhui is glad. He wouldn’t know how to respond.

Rather than waste time on words, Minghao hums, a soft and warm presence – a stark contrast to the cold and indifferent bed Junhui had been laying on all day. Minghao runs his fingers through Junhui’s hair. His hair is oily, it’s messy and unwashed, but Minghao doesn’t seem to care. Junhui closes his eyes, chin resting on Minghao’s clavicle while the younger boy continues to massage his head. It’s quiet, the only noise being their breathing and the brushing sounds coming from Minghao’s hands. Five minutes pass, then ten, then more, but all Junhui can think about is warmth. The warmth in his hair and the heat underneath him – all coming from Minghao. Junhui stirs, sitting up. Minghao’s hands don’t stop, but the expression on his face is comforting. Open, yet inquisitive. Junhui shakes his head. Minghao understands.

Minghao doesn’t pry, he doesn’t waste time on unnecessary questions. He never did. Most people though Wonwoo was the quiet one, the one who didn’t talk much or give any reactions. They were wrong. In fact, Wonwoo was more talkative than Junhui was most of the time. The other boy love to joke around, playing pranks on people he was close to and teasing them whenever he got a chance. Minghao though, Minghao was self-reflective. He liked to sit and think, and would often duck into Junhui’s room to do just that. Especially when Mingyu was being annoying.

So, instead of speaking, Minghao hugs Junhui to his chest. The older boy squeaks a little at the sudden motion, but relaxes when Minghao kisses the top of his head. He shuffles over until they’re at the side of the bed, and gets up. Somehow, he manages to hold onto Junhui and cause the other boy to stand as well. Shooting him a quizzical glance, Junhui blindly follows Minghao as the younger leads him towards the washroom. Pushing him in softly, Minghao motions towards the shower before slipping out. Junhui stares. He looks at the door, then at the shower, before sighing. He really did need to take a shower.

Just as Junhui steps into the bath, the door opens. Looking over his shoulder, Junhui spies Minghao with a pile of clothes in his hands. The younger boy waves, but is focused on swapping out Junhui’s old clothes with new ones. A new shirt, pants, even underwear. After dropping everything off, Minghao grabs the dirty clothes on the floor and leaves Junhui alone to shower. He does.

After his shower, Junhui changes into the clothes Minghao left him. They’re soft, warm even. Minghao had probably thrown them into the dryer for a little before folding them up and placing them here. He always did that whenever one of them wasn’t feeling well.

Stepping out of the bathroom, Junhui wanders into the kitchen. Minghao is there, but now, so is Mingyu. The taller boy waves, grinning happily. Junhui waves back, eyes darting to the fridge. He wonders if Mingyu knows he didn’t finish breakfast. Biting his lip, Junhui awkwardly shifts his weight, watching as Mingyu goes back to cooking. He isn’t paying attention to much else, meaning he startles when Minghao taps him on the shoulder. The younger boy smiles warmly, before guiding Junhui to sit at the kitchen island.

Hopping onto a stool beside him, Minghao places a glass of water in front of him. Gesturing for Junhui to drink, Minghao watches intently until he does. Once he begins to drink, Junhui realizes just how thirsty he was. He finishes the glass quickly, placing it down and wiping at his mouth.

Minghao smiles.

Hesitantly, Junhui smiles back. Then, when Wonwoo comes back, Junhui smiles a lot.

 

It’s raining outside, Junhui notes when Wonwoo opens the door. There’s water dripping off of his coat, and his hair is slightly damp, but Wonwoo is smiling widely. He shakes the water off of his clothes, earning a soft scolding from Mingyu, before taking his shoes off and all but skipping towards Junhui. Junhui gives him a questioning glance, wondering what had made Wonwoo so happily, and his question is soon answered.

Wonwoo hands him a book. But not just any book, Wonwoo hands him _the_ book. The latest book to the series Junhui had been reading. It was released recently, and since Junhui usually borrowed books from the library rather than buying them, he had been waiting for over a month to get his hands on it. It was a popular series, meaning the waiting list was long – even though Junhui had gotten on it the minute he found out the library had it. Now though, it was his to own.

Junhui grabs the book tenderly, like it’s a newborn. If there was one thing Junhui and Wonwoo had in common, it was that they both loved to read. Minghao did too, but less so for the story and more so for the meaning. The morals and ethics that could be examined through a story – that’s what interested Minghao. For Junhui however, it was the story itself. For him, the journey really was more important than the destination. Wonwoo understood – so did Minghao to some extent – but if Junhui ever needed someone to talk to, he’d go to Wonwoo. Even if Wonwoo wasn’t reading whatever novel Junhui was into at the time, he’d listen.

Junhui tears up as he opens the book. Fingers carding through pristine pages, he breathes in to dispel the tears, and the iconic smell of a new book hits him. He can’t wait to start reading. But before he does, Junhui leans over and gives Wonwoo a warm hug. The other boy laughs, deep voice rumbling. Junhui feels the dampness of his clothes, smells the rain on Wonwoo’s skin and hears Minghao and Mingyu muttering to each other in the background, but all he feels is thanks. So, so, so much thanks to the person in front of him, and the two behind him.

This time, Junhui smiles a lot.

This time, Junhui forgets that it’s one of those days.

 

It isn’t until later, after Mingyu coaxes some rice and chicken into him, does Junhui realize the numbing feeling is gone. He doesn’t feel better, no, there’s still an emptiness in his heart, a frustration that comes with wasting away a day, but he feels other things too. He feels grateful that Minghao came back when he did. He feels excited when Wonwoo offers to read to him. He feels mildly relaxed even, when Mingyu notices his hair is still wet and rushed him to the bathroom so he can dry it for him. In general, Junhui feels, and though the negative feelings are still there, so are the happy ones.

Happiness, Junhui thinks as he settles into his bed, is a weird thing. It’s elusive, but when you find it, it stays and stays and stays. Junhui hums as he arranges his pillows around him. His bed is soft, warm from Mingyu’s body heat (who had been chased out of the room by Minghao only minutes before). It feels welcoming, even though Junhui spent his entire day here. It was different, he feels lighter. Better. A little happier.

It might have something to do with the fact that Wonwoo is only a couple of meters away, getting into his own bed. It might have something to do with the noise outside, from Minghao and Mingyu doing some last-minute cleaning before they go to sleep. Or it might even have something to do with Junhui himself, having accepted that today was a loss, but that doesn’t mean tomorrow can’t be a win.

In the end, Junhui feels okay. The emptiness is still there, but so is the happiness, the gratefulness, the joy. It’s a balance, Junhui ponders while Wonwoo turns off the lights. A tentative balance between being okay and being numb. But it works, and Junhui is still here, still trying to figure everything out.

Today was bad. Junhui hopes that tomorrow will be better. Junhui hopes that tomorrow, everything will work out. That he’ll feel happy for no reason and won’t have to feel like he’s lying whenever someone asks if he’s okay. Tomorrow he’ll take Jihoon out for dinner, he’ll call his parents, he’ll even let Wonwoo take a shower first, to repay him for the book.

Junhui goes to sleep with one wish in mind. Junhui closes his eyes and hopes tomorrow will be one of those days.

 

The next day, Junhui wakes up and he knows.

It’s one of those days.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello! Sorry for the long spacing between chapters. I couldn't get motivated/inspiration to write for this AU and when I did, I didn't have time... Even now I am ignoring work in order to deliver this to you aha.
> 
> In any case, everyone has those days, but they don't define you. Good or bad, every day you live is one that gets added to your story. It's okay to fall back, to slip, but remember, there are always people watching out for you. On that note, if you're thinking of someone, call them. Tell them. If you think something matches them, and you can afford it, buy it for them. Nothing is more touching than knowing you were in someone's thoughts. At least, I think so.
> 
> Sorry for being cheesy and/or cringe-y with my attempt to be inspiring. Today was one of those days for me. Writing this helped me keep things under control, so I hope it'll help you in some way.
> 
> Remember that you can find me on [Twitter](https://twitter.com/alatenii) if you'd like.
> 
>   
> Hope you're smiling!  
> 
> 
>   
> ~ alateni  
> 


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